


Arcane Eyes

by nyango



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, F/M, Multi, Obsessive Behavior, Past Lives, Possession, Possessive Behavior, Seven Deadly Sins, and weird, i dont even wanna spoiler it, kind of honestly freaky
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-03
Updated: 2021-01-03
Packaged: 2021-02-28 07:07:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 16
Words: 79,738
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22549798
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nyango/pseuds/nyango
Summary: This is no ghost story.But sometimes people feel like ghosts, trapped in the past, trapped in the future and seeking out the one person, who will be able to help.After noticing something very strange during a lecture, everything changes.You are drawn into a game that is plagued by darkness. They call it The Hunt and before you can even blink, the strange glowing eyes of your classmates watch your every move. They only want to play the game but even you notice that it is becoming way more profound than they want it to be.Even the hunters can become the hunted.And if you aren't careful, their glow might rub off on you.Not every ghost story ends the same. Not every ghost is one to haunt.
Relationships: Bokuto Koutarou/Reader, Haiba Lev/Reader, Iwaizumi Hajime/Reader, Kuroo Tetsurou/Reader, Oikawa Tooru/Reader, Tendou Satori/Reader, Terushima Yuuji/Reader
Comments: 144
Kudos: 411





	1. black and yellow

**Author's Note:**

> Hi! This fanfic was originally in german but since i have non german friends who really wanted to read this... i thought why not just translate it into english! Well I will probably make a lot of mistakes so I apologise in advance but hope some of you enjoy this regardless. If anyones up to helping me with my errors, I would love you forever.

> **xx your eyes don't lie. i suppose in some ways that's true, but you could have warned me of what i was about to see, because i haven't been the same ever since. xx**

Something was wrong.

Your goosebumps didn't seem to help; your whole body signaled to you that you were right. Your eyes wandered all over the hall as the professor continued to speak at the front, as if nothing had ever happened. Maybe you were the only person who felt the strange change in the air. The temperature around you had changed abruptly and a strange wind blew through the lecture hall, sneaking around you and leaving a strangely cool feeling behind. You trembled slightly and didn't notice that you almost broke the pen in your hand in two.

You looked around carefully, then put the pen onto the paper and tried to listen and take notes. But you were distracted by the student three rows in front of you.

You often stared at his black, protruding hair. Not out of great interest, but simply for the reason that you were staring at everyone every now and then. If the reading became too boring, your gaze fell on someone who looked a little different and often stayed there a little too long. Not infrequently, your eyes were accompanied with questions and since the black-haired male had such an interesting hairdo, you had often caught yourself wondering how tall he was and how many extra inches that hair added to his height. He was one of the guys who passionately played volleyball. He and many others here - after all, the sports program at this university was one of the best. Some other guys in your lecture also played volleyball and seemed popular enough to be noticed by national teams.

Something had changed again.

He leaned casually over the back of the chair now and his left arm was dangling over the back while he his head had turned around. Your breath almost stopped when you realized he was staring at you. Maybe this would not be so peculiar that it made you feel this mixture of emotions, but what you saw when you looked him in the eyes was the second weird discovery of the day. His hazel eyes were often brown-green, but right now, as he looked at you, as if you were the last shape, the only form, the only curve and the last color left on this planet, something changed.

His eyes, although his pupils were small and his eyes feline, seemed to change in front of you while a small **black** patch of color spread in his right iris and then appeared in his left eye. You had barely exchanged a word with him before, maybe one or two hello's when you met in the corridor, but that wouldn't explain why he was staring at you so intently. His mouth tightened slightly and before you could blink you already saw a smile on his face. The one half of his mouth was pulled up and all this seemed to make him so threatening at the moment that you swallowed hard and broke off the eye contact. Your heart beat so hard that you felt it in your hands and you clung to your pen as if it were the only thing that still connected you to reality. Inside you, there was a nervousness and a fear that he had triggered that shortly thereafter, adrenaline also creeped up. You felt like you were glowing, but your hands were cold.

As already mentioned, this was not the first thing that got you so confused today and although you still wanted to wonder about his eyes - no, you had to! - it didn't work. Your eyebrows were knitted together and your expression left nothing through about your inner tumult.

The professor was still talking, and while you had to look over the head of the black-haired male to see the professor; you felt sick...

You tried hard to cling to the normality of this lecture, something that was as normal and commonplace as any other day. The many students in the room were always a comfort to you, which helped you against your loneliness. You prefered the fuller courses where you sat in the midst of so many students that you would never have been able to remember everyone's name. But the name of the black-haired guy literally burned on the tip of your tongue, as if you had to pronounce it, as if you had to realize that he was real and that everything that happened was also real. You almost even said his name outloud, yes, if it weren't for the fact that you felt even more glares on you. Your entire body seemed to know what was going on before your mind did. You trembled, your hands were cold and your heart was pounding in your chest so strong you might have fainted right there and then.

You dropped your head down, staring down at your notepad and at the open and unwritten page. Your hair fell into your forehead and in front of your eyes. So you used your hair as a curtain, peeked carefully through and scanned the room, on the mission to satisfy your curiosity. And you were right.

Tetsurou Kuroo had already turned around again. He was looking at the professor. You couldn't even say if you hadn't maybe imagined all of this, but when you noticed the bottle blonde hair of one of the guys your age, you almost fell out of your chair. He was sitting on the other side where a staircase separated your side with his. He was seated at the back of the hall, had now turned his whole body towards you and was looking at you. His eyes were empty, as empty as Kuroo's were while he was staring at you but at the same time something sparkled in them that made you think.

The dark brown eyes of the blond pulled you into a spell, but you were sure that you only imagined that because you knew that something was wrong with him and that ... annoyed you.

You seemed to be waiting for it. At the same time you wanted to look away, get up and go and never come back. He smiled smugly and as you stared back at him he laughed and you noticed the glinting metal on his tongue that you quickly identified as a tongue piercing.

Your eyes were already burning as you tried not to blink and just when you thought that and almost blinked you would have missed the **yellow** dot forming in one of his eyes. He was too far away to notice more, so you squinted your eyes to see better. And after a few seconds, you didn't have to anymore because the small dot became a larger one, until the pungent yellow color had settled over his entire iris.

And then he blinked and it was gone.

His crooked smile faded, he turned back to his desk and started writing again. A shiver ran down your spine. It was so surreal that you kept staring at his back. You were unsure if the yellow eye color shocked you more or if it was because he just blinked, turned around and pretended that nothing happened.

You wanted to get up and go to the bathroom. But that would attract everyones attention and you couldn't allow yourself to attract anyone's attention. Not after all that.

And you feared being all alone right now. The halls would be empty so you didn't want to risk anything. You shuddered at the thought of being alone somewhere in this university.

Terushima and Kuroo were guys you had nothing to do with. You didn't know what was going on here but you wouldn't put yourself in unnecessary danger. The aura in this room and the strange wind around you assured you that there was indeed a danger lurking somewhere.

You kept your eyes lowered, just looking at your paper where you lacked any words. You couldn't write. Your thoughts revolved around two colors; yellow and black. And while they didn't let you go, you could have sworn to have heard someone whispering right next to you. But no one in your row had said anything. Everyone was writing or was looking forward and you cringed.

You were getting irritated but then you heard actual words.

"The hunt begins", close to your ear, so close that you could still feel the warm breath and you twitched so hard that you tried to get away. You jumped back and a noise that was heavy with surprise and fear had left your lips.


	2. purple

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> another guy, another pair of eyes and another color.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> picking up where it stopped in the previous chapter.

**xx i enjoy your shaking form and desperate pleas of wanting me to stop. but what can i say? i love seeing you break. xx**

When the lecture ended and the first students got up and started to leave, you did not know if you should stay behind and wait until everyone was gone, or you should leave first. But you opted for the latter, packed your things quickly and tucked everything under your arm. You stormed out without waiting for someone. You had acquaintances here; students you could talk to, but you were not really close to anyone. You couldn't say that they were your friends. Outside the university you weren't staying in contact with anyone.

While you followed the group of students who all headed towards the cafeteria, your thoughts wandered back to the events just now. There was still a strange nervousness in you that made your heart tremble - it was strange. The many steps of your classmates calmed you down a bit. At the moment you felt safe. Such things have never happened to you, neither the fact that you ever hallucinated anything, nor that you heard any voices. Your life was normal, which made you all the more confused. You were not someone who believed in strange things, not the supernatural, nor ghosts or any other magic.

Totally lost in thought, you accidentally skipped a step and almost fell over but someone's arm jerked out and kept you from falling down the entire staircase.

The shock sat deep and for the first five seconds you didn't notice that the iron grip on your upper arm actually hurt. Your heart almost slipped into your pants and your hands trembled slightly.

"Everything okay?", asked your rescuer and you turned to him. It was Oikawa who had brought his fan club along. Several girls started to talk excitedly. The brown-haired man was almost a bit embarrassed, let go of you and scratched the back of his head with a smile.

"Thanks," you just said softly and focused on the floor. You weren't terribly shy, but after nearly falling into your own death, you wanted to keep an eye on the stairs. It didn't sit right with you that he was here and came to you right after your lecture. The large group that left your room was still nearby, so you tried hard to attach yourself to them.

On every other day you found Oikawa somehow ... cute, but not today. Fairly enough, today, you didn't find anyone cute, not even slightly. You just wanted to leave the day behind. After all, you still felt alarmed.

He didn't seem to let up, but adjusted to your pace until you walked next to each other. It wasn't that strange, since you followed all the other students and it looked like you were going the same way but you knew better. You had already finished any small talk with him in the morning, which is why an awkward silence spread between you.

Maybe it was just your unapproachable-looking form you couldn't shake off, no, not today. Every other day, you would smile at him and flatter him, but ...

There it was again. The feeling of change, as if a filter had fallen over the school, as if a switch had turned. You heard Oikawa speak, but you were too distracted by the feeling that was building up inside you. It was only when you heard your name that you listened and struggled to absorb and process his words.

"You know," he said softly, almost uncharacteristically for him, "I'm almost jealous that Kuroo and Terushima are in the same course as you."

His voice had a certain undertone that you couldn't identify, but something in it caused panic in you. Normally you would have laughed nervously and waved it off somehow, but you arrived in the cafeteria before you could reply. And since you didn't have your break at the same time, Oikawa said goodbye to you before you could answer. Was it pure coincidence that he had mentioned exactly these two? _Yellow and black._ There should be a plausible explanation.

Should be.

You had made your own food and brought it with you, you've done that more often lately. An empty table would be enough and you could eat and maybe connect one or another puzzle piece together. Many tables were occupied by smaller groups of friends, which is why you just sat down at a larger table where there were still a chairs empty.

Everyone did so sometimes, so that wasn't too awkward. You took out your food, followed by your notebook and opened the page you just couldn't write anything on earlier.

You recognized some dots from your pen because you had tried to write again and again. Your concentration was gone. Your eyes wandered from right to left. Your tense shoulders, your nervous insides and your cold hands bothered you altogether. You had the premonition that if you turned around now and looked around into the middle of the cafeteria, you would catch another person who was staring at you shamelessly. But you were paralyzed. The fear of getting lost in someone's eyes again and seeing their eye color possibly change made frightened you.

When you looked back at the paper, you gasped. With the pen still in your hand, you probably didn't notice that you had drawn on it because now a cat-like eye was staring back at you. You felt sick. For some reason you had circled the iris so many times that the lines were sinking so deeply into the paper, you were sure that it left prints behind the other papers too. You dropped the pen and it rolled under the table, which didn't really matter to you. You knew that eye shape, you knew who it belonged to and you started to breathe so fast that the people next to you looked at you with worry. For outsiders it sure looked like you were hyperventilating. Maybe you were. In that moment you were no longer the master of your senses.

You closed your little lunchbox, stuffed it into your pocket, picked up your notebook and started leaving. You had to get away and put your hand over your mouth. Your breakfast seemed to want to exit you and you had to make an effort not to vomit. With quick steps you went to the exit, stopped briefly standing next to a trash can and ripped out the page that had just triggered this shock in you. Hurriedly and uncleanly you folded the paper twice, tore it apart and dropped the scraps into the trash. You didn't bother turning around as you walked through the door. You already knew someone was staring holes into the back of your head. The panic that tickled on your fingertips now didn't seem to stop. Your ears rang softly and your legs felt heavy. They carried you away from the cafeteria. To your luck, there were so many students at this university that you were never really alone. There was something comforting about knowing this.

You left the first building and decided to walk around the campus for a while. The fresh air did you good, but the cold wind today had no mercy on you. Again it blew your hair around and you wrapped your arms around you to protect yourself from it. Your sweater wasn't thick enough to fight against the cold autumn air. Lost in your thoughts, you didn't realize how far you had run off to until you passed the sports field and saw some boys playing volleyball. It should have triggered something negative in you but it didn't. The volleyball net was the first thing you noticed, then the six guys playing together. You didn't know too much about volleyball, but you were sure that they weren't enough. They played three against three, but it seemed to work. The right-side setter seemed reluctant to join, but he was still good. His brown hair was up to his chin and his eyes had a bored expression in them.

He played along with a giant with gray hair who had a big grin on his face and another guy whose hair reminded you a lot of Tanakas - who was in one of your courses. On closer inspection, you even recognized Tanaka in the other team, along with a boy whose orange hair, like a colorful bird, stood out. Since you also knew the setter named Kageyama, you knew straight away that the smaller of the three had to be Hinata. You had heard a lot about them.

In the summer you often sat near the sports field to copy your notes. When you saw the quick attack of Kageyama and Hinata, you realized why everyone was talking about them. The gray-haired giant however blocked the attack; The ball touched his fingers, just enough for the bald guy to receive the ball. Their setter got the ball and played it to the gray-haired guy, who hewed with such force that the ball arrived in the field of the other team, made a point and rebounded. Everyone followed the ball with their eyes and you had to flinch in fear and take a step back to avoid getting hit.

"I'm sorry!" The giant called out to you and came running.

He smiled at you as he stopped in front of you. The ball was further away, so you didn't understand why he stopped in front of you. His body seemed so tall from close up, it felt like standing in front of a tower. His huge form seemed to rush right at you. The shadow of the treetops fell on his face, which made him look eerie.

"It didn't touch you, right?" He asked and you shook your head.

"I'm Lev Haiba," he introduced himself and shook your hand. You gave him your name and he grinned, nodding. Something in you told you he didn't need to ask. Your alarm bells had been triggered. The look he gave you then confirmed your thoughts.

He already knew you.

His eyes sparkled, the almond-like shape associated with the cheeky grin seemed to irritate you. He took a few steps, bent down and picked up the ball. You followed his every move and he caught you as he abruptly turned back to you.

The green eyes looked at yours.

Then you saw it.

The **purple** splash of color amidst its deep green. There wasn't enough time for the color to spread as Hinata shouted for Lev, who obviously took too long to retrieve the ball. He blinked and it shouldn't have surprised you anymore that the purple dot was gone, but it did and you took a deep breath. With a wave of his, he was so kind as to give you a sweet smile before he walked back to the field and left you with your thoughts. You've got your arms around you again - hugging yourself -, the danger of falling apart was too high right now.

Your hands were still cold and you could add another color to your upcoming trauma.

Another color that would haunt you in your dreams tonight.

One more pair of eyes to watch out for.


	3. orange

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> orange is the new black (eye color of possession)

> **xx you will ask, have you ever been hunted? and i will reply with a confident no, not knowing i am about to find out. xx**

After meeting Lev Haiba you had went home. Meaning you didn't attend the last two courses so you would have to get your notes from somewhere else. Your thoughts had been circling to the impossible the whole night. You dived into things that you never imagined possible, and it did not help that every time you thought about one of the different pairs of eyes, you were plagued by goosebumps that crawled up your entire neck.

When you were looking for the room for your first lecture, you had to shake off the feeling of being watched. It seemed feeble-minded but the feeling did not let you go the rest of the morning. The thought of these guys lurking around somewhere while you were getting spooked out of your skin, every time you turned around a corner made you crazy. But it was strange, was it not? Guys you barely paid attention to, nor did they notice you ever before, have now been burned into your mind. It bothered you that you believed, even if their eye colors had not changed, you would still think so desperately about them. You were not used to this kind of attention; supernatural or not. You were so nervous and frantic that your hands could not keep still. You had turned back and forth the entire night. Every time you closed your eyes, they were in front of you. Glowing pairs of eyes that did not want to let you sleep.

You got to your lecture as one of the last students, opened the double door and sighed. Only a few had looked up - some out of reflex, others for more mysterious reasons. The black-and-white-haired guy was one of them and you frowned.

Maybe the volleyball club was just cursed?

Maybe you were.

Since he felt familiar to you. You could say with certainty that you had also seen him play volleyball. A sigh rolled over your lips again and you sat down quickly. You fished out your notebook and looked forward. Today you would concentrate, no matter what happened.

The professor still arranged some papers and tapped the projector he needed for today's topics before apologizing and just walking out the door because someone called out for him. Your gaze wandered through the now exceptionally smaller hall. This course did not have as many attendees as all your others. You allowed yourself some quiet moments by looking out the windows that occupied the entire left wall.

The sun hid behind the clouds, so you rather watched the many trees that were planted between the main building and this building. The trees still had the majority of their leaves, which made you happy. You could marvel at the different colors the leaves took on and caught yourself sighing for the third time. Lately, you've barely taken a breather, which now makes you terribly self-aware. You hardly had any time for yourself.

While you were looking at one of the younger trees whose leaves had a different shape than the others, the black and white hair came back into your view. For a millisecond, you had thought his weird hairstyle was a tree until you shook your head and looked again. You almost did not dare to breathe, you did not dare inhale, but felt your body momentarily relax as you looked closer. He seemed to be looking at the wall next to you, which was not all that weird because it contained important information that had been hung up there to help. Some posters were selfmade; Students had made them. Others were hardly informative enough to help, but you could not blame him for reading them.

When you were bored and you could not concentrate, you caught yourself reading the same posters. You almost laughed at yourself. You were so sensitive right now that you feared everyone would stare at you for reasons so dark and macabre. You laid your head on your arm and flipped through your notebook. It could not hurt to refresh the memory of last week's topic before the professor arrived. You were barely at the middle of the notebook and kept flipping through until something caught your eye and made you stop.

Something ... wasn't right.

You sat up and pressed your back out. Your fingers skimmed the corners of the paper without going back one page. You swallowed hard. Your mouth was suddenly dry and your throat was tight. With a shaky hand that was too cold again, you opened the previous page. You drew in a sharp breath and could just stare at the paper.

Eyes, eyes everywhere. One yellow, the other black and another purple.

There was another color added; **orange**.

Orange, round eyes that nestled in the deepest corner of your mind. They were not as cutting as the others and for a brief moment it felt like ... like a deja-vu. Maybe the realization did not hit you hard enough, maybe the eyes did not shock you enough, but your head was already turning around. Without encountering any difficulty, or being unsure, your gaze hit the black and white haired volleyball player.

The same round eyes.

His eye color still seemed the same. His eyes were like bright honey, but at the same time they had something strangely inquisitive that might prey upon you. His posture scared you, even though he was sitting at the other end of the room, he seemed ready to attack. As if an owl was targetting its prey. And if you knew one thing, it was that they preferred to eat their food alive.

That seemed the only thought left in your foggy mind. You held your breath and did not move anymore. You were at the bottom of the food chain. They all drove you down so far that the only way out was this was to play dead.

And it did not stop, he just did not look away. His eyebrows shot up as if they weren't already intimidating enough, without making them look even more dangerous. You slowly started to breathe again, allowed yourself to inhale carefully.

After all a wise owl could not easily be tricked.

You were sure you could have set a record of not breathing, but in the end you would still have been found and preyed on just from your strong throbbing heart. He wasn't foolish enough to have been fooled by your attempts of playing dead. He would still have pounced on you - ready to attack, ready to devour you whole.

You have never felt so vulnerable. Even creepy men who have followed you once or twice in the evenings did not cause such an instinctive fear in you as the eyes of your classmates did. And then it began.

In his left eye, it started first. An orange that bubbled up like hot lava while it took possession. The sympathetic honey and gold was completely suppressed by the intense orange, which now also formed in the right eye.

You blinked; once, twice ... until his eyes glowed and stared down at you. If someone else looked at him, they would hardly notice the change in eye color, he always had sharp eyes that looked as if they knew more than you, but you saw it. You saw the destructive something in them that was hiding there. The door opened and the spell faded.

Your professor came in again, his bag tight under his arm and an exasperated expression on his face.

"I'm sorry," he said halfheartedly, leaping past you. "I was occupied a little too long." He threw his leather bag on his desk and sighed. Then he leaned against the white teacher's desk, thought for a moment and then pushed himself off of it with new energy.

"We continue where we left off last week. In the end, you can pick up comprehension tasks if you want them. I don't really care. The exams are coming soon, so it's up to you. "

You turned back to Bokuto as if you were looking for the danger that was in this boy, but met a completely different Bokuto. He sat with his body to the professor and put his head in his hands to support it while listening half heartedly.

You felt cold. The fear in you had left an uncomfortable feeling of emptiness and coldness. But when you looked down into the notebook, you still recognized the same eyes. They still caused a certain amount of panic inside of you and you were almost sure that you had drawn them, but when?

This was a new kind of impossibility you had achieved and your energy dwindled. Even though you needed the notes on the papers, you ripped the full scribbled pages out.

You crumpled them up in your hands, so long and so often, until they were so tightly crumpled that you could swear it would hurt if you threw the round paper ball at someone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact; orange eyed owls love to hunt at dawn and dusk


	4. delirium

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> things get frisky

**xx you're connected to us. i can't help myself, my soul is aching for you. xx**

Your mood had reached its lowest point. The last days had shown no mercy.

Every night you dreamed of different pairs of eyes that glowed. One day after the discovery of Bokuto's eyes, you had skipped college for a day and had stayed home all day. But the longer you stayed away, the more your thoughts circled around the four guys, who made you tremble to the bone.

The next day, you were back in college, where you once again felt like being watched. You didn't see any of them, not that day, but the moment you set foot in the main building, you felt the fear grow stronger in you as you felt your hands get colder.

You didn't want to admit it to yourself but after you missed the one day and came back after that, a realization had taken place that in a way made you even more afraid. The closer you got to the university, the easier it was to breathe. Your heart didn't seem to be trapped or laid uncomfortably in your chest like the day you stayed home. With a certain disgust about knowing this fact, you strolled towards the cafeteria.

Slowly you got used to your constantly cold hands. Often you tried clenching your hands into fists, hoping it might help to warm them. Although it was only autumn, you no longer left the house without taking gloves with you.

Now that you were in the main building and the heaters were on, you'd think you wouldn't be feeling cold. But you were. It was the only thing you knew now. Being cold.

You dropped your arms to your side and thought of your last class in which you had to copy the notes and borrow a book from the library. Your hands found the pockets of your jacket. The miserable attempt to warm them failed because even after a few minutes it did not get better and you just groaned and took them out to fix your backpack. You hadn't seen any of them since discovering Bokutos real eye color, but that didn't seem to stay that way. You suddenly discovered the blond-colored hair of Terushima, which you recognized a little too quickly for your taste.

He was talking to some classmates and they were laughing loudly. He and his friends were often very loud and had the reputation of being too playful. They didn't take things too seriously, they didn't seem to have any real limitations and they were too unpredictable.

In conclusion, they were up for any kind of fun. Something like that irritated you beyond measure.

You looked at the floor and hoped you could sneak past him without him noticing you.

They were standing right in front of the staircase and you sighed.

Your hair fell in your face and you prayed that he was too distracted to notice you. As you got closer, you also heard a few words, but you prefered to concentrate on the red linoleum floor.

At the beginning of the staircase, you stopped for a millisecond, which surprised you.

Then you sprinted down.

The question already haunting you: Why did you stop?

It was unlikely any of them had noticed your little pause but it was bad enough that you noticed that you had stopped.

You cursed quietly.

You seemed to respond only instinctively. Maybe you were briefly disappointed that he completely ignored you?

After all; you were the one who couldn't sleep since that fateful day in the lecture, so you found it unfair that he acted like you didn't exist.

You just wanted to rub your hands together again, the small hope of creating a bit of warmth was still in you, until you heard heavy footsteps coming down the stairs behind you.

Startled you turned around and saw Terushima coming to a stop in front of you. He gave you a smile, so bright you almost closed your eyes. He was only a few inches above your head. You remembered him to be taller.

You finally looked up but a fear gripped you, making you hesitate. If you saw his eyes change again, you wouldn't know what to do with yourself. That was what was missing - the last straw.

As of now, you could push everything that happened onto the fact it might have all been a hallucination or illusion because you have been way too tired lately. But if you would see it a second time with the same person ... yeah, then you'd have to deal with the fact that you weren't just dead tired and hallucinating.

No, that would mean everything you've seen was true.

Your body shook for a second, as if shaking it all off and labeling it as superstition would help you with not losing your mind. But you heard him catch up to you.

Soon he was walking next to you, still smiling.

"Hey," he said kindly and looked into your eyes. "I know you"

You looked stubbornly to the front. Ignoring every of his attempts to chatter you up.

"You're in some of my lectures," he added. "Can you give me your number?"

"No," you said succinctly and went on, without paying him any attention.

"Come on," he insisted and didn't let the smile fade from his face. "You are cute."

"Uhhh," you said and wanted to come up with an excuse. You weren't used to this kind of attention, especially during school. He took that as a sign that you were thinking about giving him a chance, took a step forward and stood before you with a proud, protruding form. His chest was like a wall in front of you now.

"I ...", you began softly. You avoided his face and his eyes.

You looked to the side, then to the floor and finally to your hands, with which you played nervously.

You've never been like this. One would think that you were the biggest wallflower on the entire campus.

But everything about him seemed to throw you off track and put the hairs on your neck up. It was overwhelming.

"You don't have a boyfriend, right?", He asked now with a fake innocent tone and bent down a little. "You can't even look me in the face."

Quite briefly your gaze shot up, where you recognized the curious and worried look of Terushima.

You didn't have to look up again to realize that he had a huge grin on his face as he spoke again:

"Do I make you _that_ nervous?"

You took a deep breath in and out. Then you overcame your inner bastard, pressed your lips together and looked up. His brown eyes were still the same. Your own took on something challenging and you threw your hair back.

"You don't make me nervous," you said now, the tone in it determined and sure. "I'm just not interested. So if you would excuse m- "

You couldn't finish, as he burst out laughing while he threw his head back.

"You're funny" he said.

You didn't know if that was a compliment, but could only watch the piercing on his tongue, as it shuddered with every loud laugh.

"I don't understand what's supposed to be funny" you replied and crossed your arms over your chest. "You are intrusive, I don't find that laughable but whatever." You shrugged, took a step to the right, so that he was no longer in front of you and wanted to go on.

You even made one or two more steps until you felt a hand on your mouth, followed by an arm that wrapped itself around your waist and pulled you back. Before you could react properly, Terushima had kicked a door open, leaned back against it, pulled you into his chest and slipped in with you.

The hospital room. But no campus nurse far and wide. Your eyes were frantically picking up everything, every corner, every door, every piece of furniture, until you felt his chest press closer against your back.

You felt his entire body heat on your back and it burned like fire. The smell of freshly sprayed men's perfume struck your nose and your heart contracted. You were sure that you were shaking in his arms but everything went so fast, you couldn't even fight him off.

When your mind finally went out of it's foggy shocked state and told you to kick wildly around, it was already too late and he had driven you into a corner where he let go of you and eyed you with new eyes.

The pungent **yellow** eyes were back and if you wouldn't be filled with fear and an adrenaline, you were sure you would faint.

"W-what ... what the hell is your problem", you managed to ask.

"You see ... if there is one thing I can't stand, then it's to be rejected."

You looked at him speechlessly. Your body in defense mode. You would jump on him, kick him, beat him, whatever would be needed to get out of this situation. You wouldn't become a victim.

"Calm down," he said, the big grin still on his face, as he tilted his head playfully. "You can't pretend or lie to me."

"Have you lost your mind?!", you pointed your index finger at him, your heart beating so fast that you almost thought it was beating in every part of your body, "stay away from me!"

He laughed, this time calmer ... softer.

It touched his eyes, which he briefly closed.

Without the yellow eyes he looked friendlier but you shouldn't think this way. Not now, not after he just dragged you into this room and held you against your will. But you couldn't help it.

The cautious smile, the hoarse and soft voice ... all this seemed to calm you down in some strange way.

"What is going on here, damn it", you spoke quietly to yourself and didn't notice the small steps he made towards you. It was not long before he was as close as he had been in the corridor, so you jumped in fright and took a step backwards.

The wall stopped you.

Now right in front of you, his black pupils fell on you again. The yellow around it was bubbling dangerously - like sulfur. As if it would immediately evaporate from his eyes and leave a nasty smell of the yellow chemical.

You could only stare while your body went limp. His face came closer to yours until you felt his hot breath on your ear.

"Your hands... they're cold, aren't they?" He whispered and goosebumps instantly formed on your skin. When they passed off of you, you could only then realize what he had said. You wanted to ask, blame, and yell at him, but the warmth that emanated from him was certainly out of this world. His right hand found your left and he tapped gently on the back of your hand.

Every touch and every tap, left a soothing burn but your fingers suffered most from the cold. He seemed to know that and before he wrapped your hand completely in his, he teased you by running his fingertips over your palm. It tickled and at the same time felt magical and the feeling that lingered there, every time he got to your wrist, let your breath hitch. When he took both your hands in his, a heat shot into them that you hadn't felt in days. Even a hot shower didn't help but his hands skillfully playing with yours, stroking the back of your hand, clasping your fingers or holding them so tight you might think your lives depended on them - all that helped.

You made a blissful sound and almost gasped when you heard yourself.

This made him smile, a smile you haven't seen until now. Something sinful swung along and burned itself into your mind. He looked at you through half-opened eyes. The yellow in them glowed and you got scared of it; again.

His face stopped short in front of yours. He tilted his head as he came closer and before you could protest, you felt his nose brushing over your cheek. He positioned himself so that his mouth was exactly against your chin and you stood there frozen as you felt his lips ghosting above your skin.

For a moment you thought he would kiss you but no, it turned out quite differently.

He stuck out his tongue, his piercing glittered briefly before you felt his tongue on your chin. He licked his way up to your temples. If you weren't too shocked, you might react, but ... there also seemed to be another reason.

His aura radiated something that influenced you. Something that was so heavy in the air, you couldn't have escaped even if you wanted to. And there was already the next problem. Your body didn't want to put an end to this nor stop.

He seemed to indulge in that special something and absorbed all of it.

Your entire right side of your face was wet. The action was so incredibly macabre and indecent, how would you ever be able to suppress the memory of it?

You felt his hands on your neck. They touched themselves up, till he buried them in your hair and started massaging your head. He kept going until you put your head back and closed your eyes. It didn't take long until you could feel his breath on your lips. The pleasant sounds that came from you thanks to his massage made his breathing sound strained.

His lips found yours.

He kissed you very carefully. They were so light on yours that it almost tickled until he lost patience.

First he pressed his piercing against your upper lip until he wanted to deepen the kiss. Maybe he would have managed to put his tongue in your mouth but you suddenly snapped back to reality before it got that far.

Wide-eyed you pushed your head back and his body away from you. You couldn't think anymore, no longer distinguish right or left, so you responded reflexively and kicked him between the legs. He moaned painfully, bent down and if you hadn't dodged immediately, he would have fallen on top of you and would have tackled you with him to the ground.

You ran.

You ran as fast as you have never ran before in your life. Your body was shaking, but you didn't care. You opened the door to leave the room, arrived in the corridor and kept running.

At a tremendous pace, you rushed from the stairs to the next pair of stairs until you found the bathrooms.

After the door closed behind you and you made sure that you were alone, you fell apart. Your body trembled unruly, you cried and your hands ... your cursed hands were cold again. You clung to one of the three sinks and could only cry, whine, and sob. With trembling hands you turned up the water and looked at yourself in the mirror.

Your make-up was smeared all over your face, your hair was ruffled, especially where his hands had been. Panicked you let the ice-cold water run over your cold hands.

You didn't want to feel the warmth he had given you, so you welcomed the cold. You pressed onto the liquid soap and scrubbed your hands, hoping to scrub off the feeling he gave you away from it as well. You kept going up, scrubbing hard on your arms and on your neck. If you closed your eyes, you still felt his tongue marking your entire face.

More soap, you needed more.

Your hands rubbed all over your face, over your lips and you almost had wanted to hold your whole head under the water. You rinsed your mouth out, but the faint phantom feeling of his touch was still burning on your face. Sobbing you turned the water off and looked at yourself in the mirror.

Did you hate him, or did you hate the feelings he made you feel? Or maybe that you had done nothing against your will?

You had enjoyed it. You had almost let him in, had lost yourself in him and clung to him ...

Disgust washed over you. You hated him but right now you hated yourself much more.


	5. green

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Another one! I feel like DJ Khaleed  
> ANOTHA ONE!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this ones a bit shorter but chapters after this one are pretty long. i have already written up to 11 chapters, it just takes me a while to translate and all.

> _**xx do you feel safe? i will make you feel safer, than all of them ever will. it's green, the color of poison, the color of envy. it's green like me. xx** _

You had spent the last hour and a half in one of the stalls and were sitting on a toilet lid. It took all of your power to not dig your fingernails into your own skin and rip it wide open.

You felt miserable. It took you some time to understand that what had happened wasn't bad - somehow. You had enjoyed most of it. While you were angry at the fact that he forced you to that leading moment, the anger you felt against yourself was stronger. It had been inexplicable. Slowly he had managed to calm you down and make you feel good.

You looked down at your hands, they looked strangely pale. He had helped. He...

"Such a damn bastard," you whispered annoyed. You were sure now, that you hadn't imagined anything. His eyes really were able to change to a sulfur-like color and you didn't know what was triggering it. It wasn't permanent though. If you analyzed it more closely, you might come to a conclusion, but you didn't have to. You believed that it was the rejection. It had triggered something in him and brought out the evil that was hiding in Terushima Yuuji.

You looked at your phone screen, which informed you that you had been in here for far too long. You got up with wobbly legs, threw your backpack over your shoulders and looked at yourself in the mirror again. You removed most of the mess, your make-up had done to your crying face but you still looked like a mess. The nose reddened, the cheeks of shame still pink and the dark circles under the eyes so deep, you'd think you hadn't slept for a week. You wish you had your concealer with you.

As you were leaving the bright toilets, several students passed by you.

They were definitely going to their next lecture, and you thought for a moment what you should do if you saw Terushima again. Then you decided to _forget_ every thought about him and decide to pretend that all this never happened. You two hadn't kissed and he certainly hadn't licked half your face off ... you cursed quietly.

"Hana," you called suddenly, as a girl with short dark blond hair brushed past you. She turned around immediately. When she realized who had called her, her face lit up and she screamed your name.

"What are you doing here?" You asked surprised. The smaller girl clapped her hands and winked at you.

"My internship ended sooner!", she informed you, "I couldn't message you. My phone fell into the toilet so now I have a new sim card. But you're standing right in front of me anyway, so..."

For the first time in days, you couldn't help but smile. You embraced each other and while you were up in eachothers arms, you realised how lonely you had felt without her.

"Do you have a new LINE ID?" You asked with a confused look on your face. Hana nodded.

"I added you, you didn't accept me" she said and pouted. The lower lip was dramatically pushed out and she looked at you with big eyes.

"You don't have a profile picture! I don't accept strangers.", you told your old friend.

"So, do tell" she said quickly and took your arm, "you're on break, right?" - you nodded - "Well, I've only been back for two days and what do I have to hear? Everyone's talking about you!"

You furrowed your eyebrows and looked at her with a perplexed expression.

"Don't talk nonsense," you said quietly, your tone a bit too sour.

"I mean it!" She leaned her head against your upper arm and laughed. "Even Oikawa's girls are annoyed about it"

"It's probably just a phase. They all most likely talk about me because I caught a cold or something and haven't been myself the past few days. I'm cold all the time." At those words, she pulled her head back to look at you but leaned right back against you.

"See", you said, offering her your hand. "Touch it."

She took your hand, barely touched it for more than a second and quickly pulled back. "Did you touch ice?" She asked in disbelief. "Your hands are so cold."

The topic of cold hands still caused a bitter aftertaste in your mouth.

"I told you," you shrugged and realized where you were going, only now, when you went up the stairs and down the hallway. "Do you want to go to the cafeteria?" The question came out with a strain in your voice.

"You don't? Come on, I missed you so much, I'll get you a tea and we can talk a bit." She pulled your arm a little, like a little sister would to annoy you. You let yourself be persuaded. It was hard to say no to her, she liked you too much and you had a weakness for people like her. People who loved too much.

It was lunch time, so the cafeteria was fuller than you were used to. You didn't live on the campus, so you only came here in the mornings. Hana upon entering, immedetialy was greeted from all directions. She had been away for weeks, so you weren't surprised - still a bit taken aback though.

She pointed to a longer table in the middle of the cafeteria. Some of her friends were sitting there and she asked you to sit down while she grabbed something to eat and promised you your tea. You steered to the table and didn't even allow yourself to look around. You didn't want to risk seeing one of them, especially Terushima. You couldn't handle it, if you did.

When you got there, you were welcomed by some familiar faces, who smiled at you and asked how you were doing. As you sat down, you put your hands under your thighs in hopes, they would warm up a bit. It barely helped.

"Isn't it wonderful that Hana is back?", said Nakamura, a girl that you knew from high school, but you never got close enough to call yourself friends.

You still used your last names to address eachother. But you smiled at her and nodded.

"Very much so" you replied and saw Hana coming back. Your blonde friend sat down next to you and put a fruit salad down, along with your tea. She signaled to you that you could eat it, if you wanted.

The black tea helped your cold hands and you put them around the cup. You three talked for a while and you were surprised at how relaxing everything seemed, even with Nakamura. It almost made you forget what things you had done before ... _almost_.

When some girls at your table began to giggle, you looked up to find out why. Hana poked your side and you yelped startled. Bad idea.

Because Oikawa Tooru was right next to your table and turned around to look at you with curious eyes. Nakamura made room for him to sit down. He didn't seem to think twice, came over to your table and sat down next to Nakamura, whose eyes began to sparkle. You were sure she was on cloud seven.

"Goda," he said to Hana, "good to see you again."

He also greeted Nakamura and almost forgot to greet you as well. He didn't say your name, paid you little attention and just nodded at you, acknowledging your existence and nothing more.

For the fact that last time you had met he had annoyed you and told you he had been jealous, he now seemed to feel very different about you. He flattered the girls sitting next to you, who asked him about volleyball, his favorite foods and all kinds of stuff you deemed too boring to eavesdrop about. You would have liked to roll your eyes but you ended up just watching his face and his reactions. He was calm, giving each girl the same attention. He never seemed bored.

"How are the classes going?" Hana asked, turning away from the girls on her right.

"Quite nice actually" you answered and grinned.

"About the topic we talked about earlier...", she winked at you with a mischievous undertone, "you seem to have some secret admirers here and there."

You understood her intentions. It even seemed to work.

Oikawa had stopped answering the many questions of the girls around you and you were sure he was now listening to you and Hana.

"You're impossible, Hana." You shook your head but ended up laughing about it.

"Hey, as already mentioned! Only two days back and I hear your name everywhere. "

"That's not surprising," Oikawa suddenly said. He put on a smile that made a shiver run up your spine. It was cool and calculated. "She is very cute, after all."

The girls on your right stopped talking. Some glared at you and started whispering, others kept their mouths shut.

That wasn't too strange. He called every girl cute, so you didn't know what was so shocking about it. Oikawa, however, put his head in his hand and looked at you dreamily. His body was almost completely turned towards you and you frowned.

You looked at him for a long time. Time seemed to stand still. Hana was about to throw a grape at Nakamura while the girls next to Oikawa stared up at him but didn't see his face. That was an important detail. That changed everything.

They only saw his hand supporting his head and the brown hair that fell over his face. But you saw something else.

The **_green_** splash of color next to his pupil.

A foul green formed in his right eye and threatened to explode. Poison green on the deep brown color he actually had, which spread right in front of you and made you gasp. If you hadn't gasped so loudly, you would be sure that the green would have spread in record time. But he winked at you, closing his right eye for half a second and when he opened it again, you didn't see any proof or any trace of what you had just seen. In your mind, you've already put him on your imaginary list of people who haunted your dreams.

Another pair of eyes, another volleyball player, another popular guy ... Oikawa Tooru.

You had found him cute, usually a bit exhausting and the many girls who always followed him didn't help, but you had no idea that he was one of them. For some reason his eye color had scared you the most. The poison green wasn't a good sign. If you weren't careful, its green would attack you from the inside and melt your skin away like acid.

And you were sure that even then, he would have put on the same cheeky grin.

"E-excuse me," you said, pressing your hand against your mouth. Your breakfast seemed to want to leave.

You took your bag and made slow but sure steps to the door.

_Do not rush. Do not draw attention to yourself._

With a slightly wobbly form you left the cafeteria. The hospital room you came by would have helped, but the memories of the things that had happened there intensified the nausea. You heard the double-sided door behind you. Someone had followed you.

"Where are you going?" Came a deep voice behind you. "Hana is worried. Are you doing well? Shall I take you to the nurs-"

You whirled around. Your face as pale as the wall next to you.

"Do you want ...", you let the sentence hang in the air and had to swallow, "do you really want to play innocent?"

He frowned, his eyebrows visibly drawn together, confused.

"I think there has been a misunderstanding here. I don't want anything to happen to you, let me at least accompany you and- "

You negate so quickly that you could swear, you heard your voice echoing throughout the corridor. His brown eyes bored into yours. At that moment, his entire being seemed to switch.

"Would you say yes, if I was Kuroo?" He asked so suddenly that your heart struck in your chest painfully at the mention of his name.

The green suddenly in both eyes.

"What ... what are you talking about?!" He came a little closer, your voices too loud otherwise, the danger too big for someone else to hear about it.

After all, it was all for your ears and eyes only.

Only you.

"Terushima ... he kissed you, didn't he?" You froze. His eyes remained largely brown, as if the green didn't have enough power to disperse completely. You still recognized it, the poison in the otherwise warm brown eyes.

He chuckled. As if the Oikawa was back, whom you really knew. He raised his arms lazily and shrugged.

"That won't happen again. Not in my presence. " If he didn't say that with his usual sweet undertone, you would almost take that as a threat, but not against you.

No, he declared war.

Sometimes you had to hunt the hunters first to have the prey for yourself.

"See you. Take care and stay as sweet as you are, okay? "

He said, before turning around. He gave you one last and sweet smile and left.


	6. red

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> so much anger

> _**xx a battle field is what is gonna be left of us. do you hear them? the warning signals? xx** _

A week had passed since you had spoken to Oikawa. You still didn't know what had happened to him and the others but you had used every single day to avoid them. You moved around like a ninja and now you had memorized every corner, every room and every little hole of the two main buildings into your mind.   
At first you felt incredibly stupid, trying to sneak around and not be seen but after three days you finally succeeded in not seeing any of them.   
You were convinced that your efforts were slowly paying off.

Hana now dragged you more often to the cafeteria, which made you so anxious that you ended up with excusing yourself and leaving early - every time.   
After the first four days, you understood what Hana meant. It was obvious how often they were staring at you, how they were watching you, or talking about you. If at first only one person noticed it, now did several more.. You wished you weren't associated with them, but there was nothing you could do about it.   
You noticed one thing, though. They were rarely together in one place.

When you had seen Kuroo after the day with Oikawa, you had caught him alone. And if you saw Terushima, the sighting of him still gave you goosebumps, then either alone or with his group of friends, which always remained the same. Never with one of the others whose eyes also glowed.

Perhaps that's why your mouth was hanging open when you came to the cafeteria today - again - and could hardly believe your eyes. For the first time since that fateful day in the lecture where you saw Terushima and Kuroo in the same place, you saw the whole group together.   
They had taken a larger, round table for themselves. Lev was sitting with long limbs, a little uncomfortable, at the table next to him Kuroo, who had put his butt on the table and his legs on the empty chair in front of him. Terushima tried to sit on a volleyball, which he put on the chair and laughed every time it rolled away. Bokuto was also sitting on the table, waving his arms wildly in the air as he looked over Kuroo's shoulder and tried to squint at his phone. Oikawa stood next to Iwaizumi and spoke quietly to him. 

Then you noticed how normal they looked. Young men fooling around, laughing and talking to each other. The sight confused you. It seemed so wrong and yet so right. That's how it should have been, that's how it used to be, all the previous months you had seen them. You tried to remember whether this strange bunch was always so familiar with eachother but you couldn't say for sure whether they were or not.

Iwaizumi caught you staring and you looked away in surprise. You didn't expect him to turn around. You had sat down at an empty table; the cafeteria was uncharacteristically empty this Tuesday morning. Hana had texted you, informing you that she would arrive a little late. Your books were scattered in front of you while you were looking for Hana - maybe she would be able to make it earlier.

You wanted to go through the stuff from the last lecture together. You tried to appear busy, but that didn't seem to work as well as you hoped.   
Iwaizumi had come to your table, his eyebrows raised and his shoulders tense. You had often exchanged one or two word with eachother. You knew him as a nice guy who was probably the only one who could keep Oikawa in check.

His lips were pressed together and his expression told you that it was difficult for him to sought you out like that.   
  
  
"May ... may I sit down?" He asked and you looked at him in surprise. 

You nodded and pointed to the empty chair in front of you, which he immediately pushed back to sit down. The tense posture didn't seem to leave him and as soon as you realized how you two were being stared at and watched from the other boys' table, you felt similiar. The many looks made you nervous.   
  
  
"How are you?", he asked after a seconds of silence.   
The otherwise grumpy expression seemed to subside, the genuine undertone in his voice was now clear.  
  
  
"I'm fine", you replied. You were a little confused by this sudden attention. He hadn't shown any strange traits that had appeared in the others, so this surprised you a lot more.

You couldn't tell if he was like them, after all, he was always with Oikawa, but the line of thought between his eyebrows almost assured you that he was himself.  
  
  
"How are _you_?" You asked carefully. Lately you have been more and more afraid that someone would reveal their glowing eyes to you with just one wrong word from you.   
He looked at you with wide eyes and straightened up as if afraid that he would make a strange impression on you.   
  
  
"Good," he simply said.   
For a fleeting moment he focused on the books on the table and last but not least, on your notebook that was wide open.   
  
  
"I-" he started, scratching the back of his head a little embarrassed. "I wanted to apologize for the idiots back there."   
He pointed his head towards Oikawa, where the others were sitting with him. They averted their gazes when you looked up to follow Iwaizumis gesture.

You decided to act naive. This could have many options after all. So what exactly did he apologize for?   
  
  
"What do you mean?" Your question seemed to upset him and his shoulders stiffened.   
  
  
"I know they get on your nerves a little. They talk too much, look too often ... it stands out." 

You took his words in with caution.   
Did he really mean it well, or did he know? Like actually know...   
  
  
"You mean the rumors?" Your head now cocked up and you looked at him with innocent eyes.   
He nodded.   
  
  
"I have noticed that many students are talking about you. I keep telling them to stop."   
  
  
"You do?" You asked, almost shocked, as if you couldn't believe someone was standing up for you.   
  
  
"Yes", he paused and finally seemed to relax a little, "they are too obvious. It’s almost like they’re talking about you all the time and it’s like a game for them.”

Now you were intrigued.  
  
  
"Can you explain that in more detail?"   
He looked at you, nodding, as if he had been waiting for that moment to finally let off some steam.   
  
  
"There are days when I think they forgot everything they said an hour ago and it just pisses me off that they can't leave you alone. You don't deserve it. I heard about Terushima."   
You swallowed hard.   
  
  
"What?!", you almost shouted out but he raised his hands innocently.   
  
  
"Only me and them know about it," he explained to you but it didn't make the situation any better. It was humiliating.   
  
  
"They go too far. Honestly, they should stay away from you. I mean, I defend them in every other way, I try to get this idiot Oikawa on the right track and they do such bullshit. "   
His voice took on something sour, as if every word was spit out with anger that grew stronger the more he talked.   
  
  
"You've been friends for so long," you said.   
You ran the risk of destroying their years of friendship and got anxious. You didn't like this at all.   
  
  
"Yes, that shows that you don't know someone as well as you thought. They are _obsessed_. Do you know that Oikawa hasn't been training for days? ”   
  
  
"You have a game soon," you said and immediately regretted it.

The now angry expression on Iwaizumi's face spoke volumes. His hand on the table clenched into a fist and without realizing it, hit the plate so hard that it bent under his force. Your books almost flew in the air.   
  
  
"Tell me," you said now in a muffled voice, partly because you were afraid that they would listen in somehow from somewhere and partly because you tried to calm him down. "Have you noticed anything else strange about the others lately?"   
  
Their loss of memory was strange enough. You would write that down if you were alone. But maybe he had something else that could help you with this whole thing.   
  
  
"Well," he started and shrugged, "you'd be surprised how many layers Oikawa really has. He can even be quite fragile. I always thought that even if he was so annoying, he was a very good volleyball player and someone with a pure heart, you know. "   
That seemed to make you think. You remembered Kuroo, who might have been intimidating but could have hurt no fly. Or Terushima, who was really just fooling around and hanging out with his friends, but you would never have put him in connection with ... well, such brute force.   
Lev, who was huge but younger and more naive than all the others. You knew he could be as silly as Hinata, but surely wasn't one who was up to some evil.

You knew from Oikawa that he was a charmer. His best friend had just confirmed that he had other sides, other facades, which made him somewhat unstable, but just how he dealt with all the girls and always smiled made it hard for you to believe that he was deliberately malicious. You didn't know enough about Bokuto, except that he too was liked by everyone and portrayed as a silly idiot who always laughed and cracked jokes - with a love of volleyball that made him passionate. So maybe you could conclude that they weren't targeting you and doing all of this to you on purpose. They didn't really seem to know what they were doing themselves. At least that's what you wanted to believe.   
  
  
"Iwaizumi," you said after a short silence and he immediately looked up. "Could you please tell me how you ... how do you know about Terushima?"   
  
You had to ask. You had to find out how he had talked about it and when. Did he boast about it? Or had he felt miserable that he had done this to you?   
The line of thought between his eyebrows only got deeper as he processed your question.   
A mix of emotions formed on his face; Anger, confusion and worry.   
The dark eyebrows betrayed him well.   
  
  
"I just want to know how he said it," you said, looking at him with pleading eyes. You tried to explain yourself as best you could before the nervousness and panic choked you and your cold hands made you shiver again. Not only the glowing monsters with which you had to grapple now caused chaos in you, no, the fear came crawling back and anchored itself in your veins, crawled under your skin and let your little hairs stand up.   
  
  
"I see", he said, "I wouldn't have noticed if he hadn't ... shouted it out proudly. In the middle of the locker room after we played volleyball. I was only there because I had cleaned up. When I came in ... I saw them in a circle and Terushima in the middle. He screamed out that ... _it_ happened."   
  
Iwaizumi didn't look at you anymore as he told you what he had seen.   
  
"It hasn't sounded ... good. The feeling in my stomach told me that it didn't happen fully with your consent. I don't even know what happened afterwards, but I went after him. ”   
You winced. Did he attack Terushima because of you?   
  
  
"You ... you-" you couldn't finish talking.   
  
  
"I went up to him and punched him, yes." He said the sentence with such hatred that it almost came out as a hiss. As if he was spitting poison or would start biting at any given moment.

You couldn't have calmed him down even if you tried. He continued to hiss with hatred.   
  
  
"Honestly, I would have loved to punch him again and leave him there. He was lucky that the others were there." His body trembled slightly from absolute rage that took control over him. It was a hissing fire that got bigger, the longer he talked.   
  
  
“He and Oikawa make me so fucking angry, they can both piss off. All of them can. "   
You almost thought he would hit the table again and this time - you thought - it would break under his strength, but it didn't get that far. He looked up, his eyebrows drawn together so that his brow furrowed together and if you didn't know that his anger wasn't actually against you, you would fall apart under his gaze.

You looked at each other for a while, his breath heavy and rapid, his nostrils bloated. If you hadn't known better, you would have thought that the little red drop that was now forming in his left eye was blood. It dripped into his iris as if it were the most normal thing in the world and seemed to spread like water. It swam back and forth and filled its green eyes and you almost whimpered.   
You wished you could stop it.

At least with him. At least once.

Maybe it was the shock of seeing this striking red but you felt sick.  
Your eyes blinked, looked up again, but all you could see was how they filled up as if they wanted to drown the green.

And you stood up.

You stood up so fast that you felt dizzy for a moment and you would have preferred to walk over to the group and yell at them. You would be lacking the words you wanted to throw at their heads but they deserved to be shouted at - they deserved your anger.

You had nothing to say anymore, no " _excuse me_ ", no " _I have to get out of here_ ", you wanted to be away before his eyes were fully red and hoped someone else would see it. You didn't hope to go mad and you hoped for normalcy, but you weren't granted those desires, so you grabbed your notebook and bag. You would leave the books there, the risk too high that his hands would reach up for you if you took too long.

So you let him sit there, his clenched fists trembling, the table top was slightly bent and your stomach was spinning. You wanted to throw up. You didn't make it far. He seemed to have gotten up right after you and you were just turning your back when you were sure that he was really behind you. Some students went past you, you felt sicker but you didn't want to show any signs of it.

With quick steps you went to the girls' bathroom. You were no longer sure whether he would wait in front of it or just leave. The red eyes were proof enough that you couldn't trust anyone anymore. Your head turned. Your stomach rebelled and you pushed yourself away from the closed door and went past the sink to get to the cabins.

You didn't want to look at yourself in the mirror anymore and a feeling of a Deja Vu came up in you; the memory of the day with Terushima still fresh. You almost wanted to weigh yourself in safety, to postpone the worry about whether he would actually wait in front of the door or just go, but that didn't seem to happen. The loud slamming of the door should no longer scare you, but it did. You almost jumped into the air and immediately pressed yourself against a cabin door.

Iwaizumi had actually come in. Into the girls' bathroom.

His hands were in his pockets, his shoulders pulled back, his eyes glowing red as he fixated you and just strolled over to you as if he had done that dozens of times before.  
  


"I'm quite offended. That was pretty rude, just leaving me behind when we were having a nice little chit chat..."   
He was talking nonchalantly, but you were too busy trying to get away from him. With your back pressed against the cabins, you moved backwards. Realizing that you were only being pushed further into the corner, but there was nothing you could have done. Your body did what it wanted to to survive because at that moment it looked bad for you. Your instinct rang the alarm.

  
The deepest and oldest reflexes and instincts were awakened in you, the closer Iwaizumi came. It was about survival, you knew that much. When you reached the last cabindoor and staggered over your feet while still pushing yourself against the doors, your hands touched an endless void when you tried to locate where the cabin ended and the wall started.   
You couldn't take your eyes off of him.   
His steps were so confident, his posture changed and became daring; he knew what he was doing to you, what he was triggering in you and why. Whether he would tell you, was a completely different question.

You could only wait for him like a vulnerable lamb rubbing against the wall. It didn't take long for him to arrive right in front of you. His long legs made such big strides that you were even surprised that it took him so long. He cocked his head to one side while standing in front of you.   
  
  
"Aren't you going to open your mouth now?"   
Another question, again no answer that you could give him. The fear was anchored in your bones, if you had opened your mouth now, you would stutter.

  
You blinked and when you opened your eyes again you almost missed how his gaze on you changed. There was a danger lurking inside them.  
His entire body towered over yours. His already larger shape and broad shoulders would intimidate everyone, but as close as he was to you, with the immense anger in him, which was reflected in the red eyes, he would drive even the bravest men away.

Your legs trembled slightly, you tried to crouch a little to somehow escape him, but his arms, now leaning against the wall behind you, officially trapped you in. He seemed to like the way you wanted to look away but couldn't. Every time your eyes met, you winced. The intensity in it was overwhelming. They sent a shiver down your spine.   
  
  
"How annoying," he commented and went back a little, taking his arms down again.  
His hands found his pockets and he eyed you with a snarl.   
  
  
"You just had to keep asking," he said reproachfully and you didn't understand, "I gave you some hints, just the slap against the table should have stopped you, but you stupid child, you had to keep asking. My host got so worked up that I had to take over. And believe me, I didn't want to show myself. Not yet anyway, because you know, I'm not like the others. Perhaps you have already noticed that."

His eyes almost bubbled and threatened to evaporate. The red in them was so deep you feared it would soon overflow. They just didn't want to keep still, the red simmered, boiled and swam back and forth. Different shades of red formed and wanted to take the upper hand.   
  
  
"I'm not like Terushima, whose only problem was to seduce you. Or Kuroo, who will probably visit you soon enough, because he simply cannot cope with the fact that Terushima was allowed to taste you first. Let's ignore Oikawa, who would do anything out of envy; even if it meant stealing the toys of his playmates, which in our case is you."

  
He came very close to you, his breath hot in your ear and continued to speak in a muffled voice.   
  
  
“You poor poor thing hardly deserve my attention, but here we are. You were chosen. I could explain what for, but will your little bird brain understand that?"   
He took his head back and took a deep breath, as if to stop getting angry, which he couldn't. His left hand grabbed at your neck, he wasn't careful like Terushima with every move he made, no, he was rude, impatient and so so angry.

His fingers wrapped around your neck. The soft, warm skin seemed to surprise him for a second, as if he'd forgotten that you were actually made out of flesh and blood and he squeezed so hard that you thought you were drowning.   
  
  
"You are probably asking yourself: Why you? I can answer that for you.” The hand on your neck rested on the back of it now, where it remained. "Don't think you are that special. You're not. You just had the bad luck of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Do you remember the first time you met us? And I really use _us_ here very loosely. You were the first to notice the change in the air. You noticed our arrival without even knowing that we had arrived. You quickly realized that something was different and if I hadn't felt your fear immediately, I might not have chosen you at all. In a way you were different, yes, but does that mean something good? Just look at what you got into." Deep breaths again - he seemed to be fighting with himself. "Your sophistication doesn't seem to be paying off"

His other hand followed and joined the other. They now both clasped your neck and the panic that started within you silenced you. He didn't squeeze; instead, you just felt him pull your entire body towards himself and then smash it against the tiled wall with full force. He had held you by the neck before you came crashing down with your head first. That didn't lessen the pain that you felt through his tremendous strength. Your shoulders ached from the impact and your head was still hitting the wall, even though your back had took the most impact.

When you looked up to look him in the eye, you only saw the furrowed eyebrows that made his eyes look smaller; sharper ... more dangerous. You found no spark of emotion in them except anger. The rage he had against you seemed surreal, as if he had done nothing but hate you all his life. Before he could do anything again your hand snapped up and tugged weakly on his sleeve.

Trying to stop him wouldn't work, but you tried anyway. Your fingers bored into the soft fabric of his sweater. He looked at you with a pejorative look, as if that touch disgusted and put him off.   
  
  
"Please" you managed to ignore the pain on your back "Iwaizumi, please listen-"

You couldn't go on talking. Your fingers had worked their way up and gripped at his wrist. He was warm, almost hot, as if he had a fever, but your cold hands seemed the perfect contrast. So perfect that he immediately let go of you and took his hands back as if you had burned him.   
  
  
"Never touch me again," he choked out and you almost thought he was going to pounce on you, but he kept a certain distance.   
  
  
"The game, this hunt," he said, his jaw tightening, "it all started. If I were you, I would be careful."  
And for the first time you saw something change. The red in his eyes faded slightly. The actual green seemed to break out and _he_ seemed to notice it.   
Whoever _he_ was.

He closed his eyes as he rubbed his wrist as if he had to remove your touch from his skin and when he opened his eyes you gasped. The top half of his right iris was green again, as if the red was gradually disappearing. You could only gawk while his eyes didn't soften. The left eye still had the dominant red, but to see the little green again, had made you hopeful.   
  
  
“Your peers are the scum of this world. There's nothing you can do about it or that we're here. You could just look at us wrong and we will come out to play with you. Remember that. For my part, I would avoid my host. Of course he doesn't know what I'm doing to you, but I don't want to see your face. But maybe I'll come looking for you if you get too cheeky. Your strange emotional balance pisses me off, do you know that?"   
  
  
"What ... what do you want from me?" You had finally found your voice again but after you said that, the red seemed to flicker as if you had kindled it again and you pressed yourself flat against the wall.   
  
  
"If you humans ... become so ruthless and sin at the same time, then we appear and manifest ourselves in people who already carry us in them. Your little friend here has a lot of anger problems, you know that right?” His eyebrows shot up questioningly and you frowned.   
  
  
"Don't act stupid," he commented immediately at the sight of you, "I'm a little disappointed and extremely angry that you were selected ... it's partly my fault, but ... we'll _get_ you too."

You looked at him for a long time. Not sure if you were waiting for the red to go away on its own, but you didn't feel like it anymore. Whoever he was, was getting on your nerves.

You gathered your last strength, pushed yourself off the wall and ran towards him. His eyes widened for a short moment, just when you were close enough.

You didn'tt stop or slow down, but ran at him in full speed. When you hit his side with yours and shoved him away, you started smiling.You had wanted to kick him again before you ran out, but that was still Iwaizumi who didn't deserve it, so you didn't look back and sprinted towards the door until you reached it.

You would run all the way home until you were sure you had put enough distance between him and you. You needed a way out ... a solution.  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> just gonna say... i love iwaizumi


	7. chilling detection

> _**xx i will die on his hill, thinking i can save myself. maybe being devoured alive doesn't sound so bad after all? xx** _

Your eyes were burning.  
You looked at your pin board, which hung lonely above your desk. The stuff covering the board were different from the pictures and notes that were there just moments ago. In your hectic pace you had taken everything else off the walls and thrown it into a corner.  
The two small lamps only minimally illuminated your room, which was better that way. Your eyes were strained and tired.  
You had spent the entire last night trying to come up with various theories.  
Your mind had officially declared you crazy, but after the thing with Iwaizumi ... you were sure, you had to do something about the person who had taken possession of him.  
You had to protect yourself and find a way to stop it all.

There were now new notes on your board with all the names of the boys who were clearly involved.  
You had connected them with a red thread.  
A black thread pointed to the theories that had came to your mind. One crazier than the other.  
But you couldn't get his words out of your head.

"The boys already had them in them", you murmured aloud, "which is why they choose these boys."  
You thought back to Oikawa, who Iwaizumi mentioned an important word about - perhaps even ignorant of how important it really was.  
 _Envy_. He acted out of envy.  
And Iwaizumi who often got angry with his brown-haired friend, would explain why the being in him was just as angry. Both of them already had these feelings before they were reinforced by those beings.

"They're not really feelings," you said, walking up and down.  
Your cat Tofu looked at you, hopped onto the table from which you had chased him down several times that night and started to play with the wool that you also wanted to use to decorate your pin board.

"They're not feelings, Tofu," you said suddenly, whereupon the gray cat jumped into the air and meowed at you. "He said it himself. They are _sins_ ... yes, of course!"  
You sat back at your desk, picked Tofu up and put him on the floor.  
Your hands almost flew over the keyboard and with various typing errors, you had googled for details to reinforce this theory.

"The seven sins" you said aloud, as if Tofu would want to join in and hear about your theory, "pride, lust, envy, wrath, gluttony, greed and sloth."  
You could have argued about the translations, but you stuck with the two sins that you were sure you could relate to someone.  
You took one end of the red wool and grabbed a scrap of paper. You wrote the word _anger_ on it, took a needle and put it on the pin board, where you immediately connected it with the red wool cord to Iwaizumi.  
The next piece of paper was torn off and labeled: _Envy._  
You did the same as with the previous snippet, but the string now led to Oikawa's name.

"But ... they're only six," you noted as you looked at the names. Did you make a mistake? Could you have put too much meaning in Iwaizumi's words?

"Another one," you said suddenly, pointing to Tofu who had laid down on your duvet and was still looking at you. "Another one with glowing eyes."  
A shiver ran down your spine. Someone you haven't met before. Who was the last one?  
Something about knowing someone would come, but not knowing when, left a strange feeling that spread through you.  
You hadn't gone to university for the past few days, which is why your chest felt like someone was constantly pushing against it, but now a mixture of fear and disgust washed over you.

  
Hana had spammed you and said she had collected your books that you had forgotten in the cafeteria. Kuroo had told her about it and when you read his name, your heart dropped.  
The very threat of Iwaizumi, who had said that Kuroo would be visiting you soon, worried you, but doing this whole thing of acting all nice and helping you... made you angry. They were acting fake in front of Hana and you couldn't help but keep your mouth shut about their real faces and what their hands wanted to do to you.

  
You had told her that you had a cold, and she didn't hesitate to tell you that they asked about you and wished you well. Every day.  
You felt like they were doing it on purpose because they knew that it was hard for you to hear from them, and at the same time you couldn't help thinking that they were really wondering when you would come back.  
Because you had noticed something during your encounters with Iwaizumi and Terushima.

While Terushima had longed for your touches and enjoyed them, they had left a strange feeling in you too. It was certainly no accident that he knew about your always cold hands.  
And when you accidentally touched Iwaizumi, he reacted so strangely that you were convinced that he felt the same thing that Terushima did. In any case, none of this seemed to sit right with him. Neither for you.

The longer you thought about it, the more gradually you seemed to come up with which sin you could connect Terushima with.  
You immediately ripped the paper on your desk into a smaller piece and wrote the word on it that somehow frightened you the most.

_Lust_. The creepy desire he had in his eyes.

You let the wool thread go in the direction of Terushima's name and linked it all like this.  
You had assigned three, only four were missing.

  
You sighed and sat down on the swivel chair that stood in front of your table. Your frosty hands reached for your coffee cup. You already had three coffees, what bad would a fourth do? Except warm your hands a little.

While it helped keep you awake, it also increased your nervousness and the jitteriness that was in your legs. Your heart was already painfully laying in your chest and you had the feeling that the coffee only strengthened it, but you couldn't sleep now.  
You've been awake for 27 hours.  
Your nightly rest was no longer relaxation.  
Every time you closed your eyes, you saw the glowing eyes of your classmates and now that the red pair of eyes from Iwaizumi was added into that mix, it was all the more difficult for you to fall asleep.  
They still simmered in your dreams.

Your shoulders still hurt and you were considering going to a masseuse. But the bruises that had formed on your neck and the bruises caused by the impact hardly made you look in the mirror in shame.  
There were still some headaches that rarely appeared.  
You wore a turtleneck sweater even within your own four walls to hide any evidence of what had happened between Iwaizumi and you.  
His fingers left such perfect marks on your sensitive skin that you didn't dare touch them.  
After all, he had tugged and pinched the back of your neck so you weren't surprised at the now purple and blue colors that were gracing your skin.

How had your life changed so suddenly that you were even afraid to go outside?  
You had to walk around with bruises and discolorations that were done to you in such anger and with a violence that made you shiver. But you couldn't tell anyone about them.  
It wasn't Iwaizumi's fault. It wasn't him.

Not his mind, not his consciousness - even if it was his hands that have been around your neck, he wasn't the one who decided to do it.  
You tried to think rationally, not to let yourself be controlled by the panic in you. Maybe you understood more and more what his words meant.

The emotional balance he mentioned made sense.  
You hadn't done anything extraordinary in your life so far or let yourself be carried away, neither by people nor by feelings.  
You had studied for school, improved yourself as a person and found yourself. You were in tune with yourself, which many couldn't say about themselves.

You were fine alone without feeling lonely.  
You never had a boyfriend before or anything close to a best friend - but that was how you knew life and preferred it.  
There and not there.  
Emotional, but distant.  
Even if someone around you had an anxiety attack, you were there to calm them down because you always knew how.  
If you had bad days, you were able to come back and stay grounded and just focus.  
You knew yourself too well.  
That's why you were so balanced.

But you had to admit, all of that had shaken your balance.  
You had never felt all these feelings, especially negative ones, in such a short distance.  
They had brought out things in you that you tried to hide.  
This is how it should stay; hidden.  
No matter what they tried, you would get in their way. You wouldn't let yourself be brought to your knees that easily, glowing eyes or not.  
They had chosen the wrong person.

Even though you did everything not to fall asleep, you felt your body grow heavy. Your eyelids were fighting fatigue, but before you could stop it, it went black around you and you fell asleep at your desk.  
Hours later you woke up, immediately sitting up. You had to blink a few times until you realized that you had actually fallen asleep and that the sun was now shining through the darkened window.  
The memory of the last few seconds of your dream was still floating in your head; most of them pairs of eyes that looked back and forth in the total darkness. They were glowing and wouldn't leave you alone. Following you through the void that was your dream. Nothing new then.

Only after a few seconds of waking up did you notice that your cell phone was ringing and that it was not your alarm tone.  
With an exhausted body, tired eyes and a booming head, you got up, trotted to your bed, where you had thrown your cell phone onto and picked up your phone.  
It was Hana.

"I have good and bad news," she said immediately without greeting you first.

"The bad ones first," you said in a rough voice and coughed softly.  
You sat back in the swivel chair, let the backrest move back and laid on it.

"So the professor is asking for a group presentation, like last year and you hate the topic," she informed you and you looked around your room. You had wanted to look for Tofu, but noticed him under your table where he had made himself comfortable next to your wall heater. “And the good news is that we are in a group together. The two of us and another girl, I don't know her name. The one with the purple hair clip. "

"Emishi," you said, staring at the bulletin board that you created while deprived of sleep. It looked like a crazy woman had done it.

"Oh yes, exactly! Her." said Hana in her otherwise delighted tone. "You sound a little better. How about Emishi and I come over there and split up part of the work? I'll bring you something delicious to eat too! "

"Yes, yes," you said, lost in thought, and stared at the snippet with Kuroo's name on it, "whatever you want."

"Will you be home all day?" She asked, visibly excited to be able to visit you.

"Mhmm," you said deep in thought. Kuroo's name was triggering something in your mind. You felt like you should know about the sin possessing him.

"Okay, see you later!" Hana said and hung up before you could answer. Perhaps it had taken you too long because you were still staring at the piece of paper with Kuroo's name on it.  
Only a few minutes later did you realize that Emishi and Hana would come over.   
You got up with a sigh. It was no use laying around lazily. You had to feed Tofu and then tidy up a bit.

**_▪︎ ♧ ▪︎_ **

Every time you came past the pinboard, you couldn't take your eyes off of it. It almost captivated you as if the secrets of the universe were right in front of you.  
You had cleaned up and got dressed and were now thinking about taking the pin board down so that Hana and Emishi didn't declare you crazy. You almost doubted your mental health yourself, so you didn't want to know how the bulletin board came across innocent people.  
You were just thinking about a place where you could put the large pinboard without being found when your phone rang again.

"Yes? Hi, Hana” you greeted your friend.

"Hey," she said and you stopped in your movements immediately. There was something strange about her tone.

"Everything okay?" You asked a little worried now.

"Yes, it's just ... a change of plans," she explained and you frowned almost imperceptibly, "I'll explain everything to you when we're there. We'll ring the bell ... "

"Okay," you just said before hanging up and dropping onto the bed.  
Tofu came to you and sat on your outstretched leg while you half laid there thoughtfully.  
Should you be worried?  
Maybe they had just changed the subject and taken one that you hated even more?  
Tofu's purr made you relax a little and you stroked the gray cat.  
It took less than ten minutes for the doorbell to ring, causing Tofu to scurry away. The cat was incredibly curious, you were sure he would come back once you opened the door to greet your friends.

You stood on your bed to get to the top corners of your pinboard so you could take it down.  
Carefully, so as not to drop the threads and pieces of paper and all the related items, you removed it from the nails and stowed it into your closet, whereupon your doorbell was rang a second time.

"I'm coming" you cried out, as if she could hear you. These were apartments and you were on the fifth floor.  
You pressed the button that caused Hana and Emishi to be let in at the bottom and just waited for it to knock on your door. Hana already knew the procedure. It wasn't the first time that she came over.  
You saw Tofu coming around the corner. He came out of the small kitchen and looked into the hall where you stood and waited with your hand on the doorknob.

When it finally knocked at the door, you opened it immediately; a smile on your lips.  
A smile that vanished not even a second later.

Hana was standing in front of you, but there was no sign of Emishi.  
It was the large shape of the black-haired volleyball player, whose arrival Iwaizumi had already announced. But it shouldn't have been like this.  
He shouldn't have known where you lived. None of them should have.  
Yet here he was, standing in front of you. Kuroo Tetsurou.  
A crooked smile on his lips that made your legs tremble. The large shape was intimidating and the cat-like eyes immediately focused on yours.

You didn't know how long you stood there, but a hissing Tofu seemed to bring you back to reality.  
Tofu's entire body was in a defensive mode. The tail in the air, the pupils dilated.  
And he hissed so loudly that you couldn't remember the last time he had hissed this way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks for the kudos! Also comments make me extremely happy!


	8. diamond eyes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> bling bling

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> continues right after the last chapter.

> _**xx are you an ally or a foe? i might never know. but you're set to destroy, whatever i try to make flow. xx** _

_It was Pride that changed angels into devils; it is humility that makes men as angels. - St. Augustine_

The mood was heavy in the air. Hana and you stood at your front door, your voices merely a whisper.  
You didn't want to argue outside the door. A feeling in you also told you that Kuroo couldn't have been rid off so easily.

He was sitting on the carpet in your room, his long legs stretched out. You literally stared holes in the back of his head and were sure that he felt it, but even if he did, he showed no sign of it. You hadn't looked at him yet, just told him to come in and go ahead and he seemed so out of place.  
It just looked wrong how he was sitting in your room. In your own safe walls. In the room in which you had locked yourself in and had suppressed the memories of the past few days.  
You watched him call out for Tofu. It seemed almost personal to him that your cat didn't like him.

You sighed. That was the first sound your strained body let out after you let him in - albeit reluctantly.  
Hana looked up with apologetic eyes, the sense of guilt written on her face. She felt bad.

"Hana ..." you started, but she immediately looked down as if she couldn't take the disappointed undertone in your voice.  
Again you looked at the end of the hallway to stare right into the room through the open door. No matter how many times you looked up to check if he was still there, it was still strange.

"What is he doing here?" You asked quietly. Your forehead wrinkled and your arms crossed over your chest. "Why is he here?"

"I ... I don't know," she said, leaning against your closed front door - visibly sad. "It was so sudden. We were assigned with Emishi. I was about to leave the room when he came up to me and said there had been a small change.”  
You looked at her with confused eyes. But she just continued:

"He said that Emishi wanted to switch with him because she wanted to be in a group with Terushima."  
Goosebumps formed on your skin when you heard his name. The sin you associated with him seemed to flash in your head after attention.

"They usually have nothing to do with each other, do they?" You asked.  
You then saw Hana shrug her shoulders and raise her eyebrows.

"I thought so too. And that was so strange because he was really pissed off. "

"Who?"

"Terushima. He was really angry that Kuroo is now in our group.”

"And why did you bring him with you, Hana? Honestly..."

"I swear to you, he worried about you every day! His idea was it to bring you some other ingredients in addition to eating to make a tea to cure your cold. He is now part of our group anyway. I didn't think ... I don't know, everything about the moment when you opened the door was strange. The closer we got to your apartment, the ... "  
You listened intently. What did she want to say? What had she noticed?

"The more ... smug and confident he got. The smug smile, the proud pose." She followed your gaze and looked at him for a long time, until she spoke again. "I am sorry."

Before she felt worse and this situation slipped completely out of your control, you put a hand on her shoulder. She looked at you in surprise and you gave her a little smile.

Together you entered your room, where you now found Kuroo at your table.  
He held a picture frame in his right hand and stroked along the torn-out page of your notebook that you forgot to close.  
The picture he was looking at was of you and your best friend from kindergarten at the time. You were missing some front teeth while smiling at the camera and raising your hands for a peace sign. On your wrists were various colorful and mostly homemade plastic pearl bracelets, which were very trendy at the time.  
Your friend next to you also had them on and the picture was one of your favorite pictures.  
You literally stomped up to him and quickly pulled the frame out of its claw.

"Okay," you said, put the picture back in its place and crossed your arms over your chest, "Rule number one; don't touch anything! "  
The black-haired male raised his hands soothingly and smiled.

"Cute picture" he commented, looking back at it again. "But tell me, were you sure that the bracelets were actually in fashion?"  
Without paying attention to him, you pushed yourself past him and closed the notebook and thus blocked his view to your pictures. You glared at him silently.  
He looked around the room and watched Tofu staring at him from the other side.

"Tofu doesn't seem to like you" Hana said, who had now sat on the fluffy carpet in the middle.

"I'm more of a dog type anyway," Kuroo replied, shrugging his shoulders. "But cats usually like me."  
You looked at him with doubtful eyes and in return he gave you a look that upset you somewhat. It burned on you and was so complacent that you instinctively rolled out the turtleneck further and pulled on it as if he could see right through it.  
His eyes followed your movements, focusing on your fingers boring into the fabric, then your sweater, which was so tight around your neck that it started to tingle in his fingers. He would like to tear the ridiculous piece of cloth off your neck.

His knowing eyes told you that he knew what you were hiding underneath and you swallowed hard the lump that had formed in your throat.  
You were about to say something to ease the tense mood when a phone rang.  
It was Kuroos.  
He didn't even bother to walk out of the room before answering, but he took his time picking up.  
It rang four times as he stared at the screen and seemed barely to grimace.  
When he finally did pick up, you were so curious that you wished you had seen who was calling him and made him react this strange way.  
He only took a few steps towards the door before stopping in front of it.  
There was no "hello" or any other kind of greeting. The person on the other side of the line seemed to have come up with a question because he answered with "yes" immediately.  
You only saw him from the side, but the broad grin that formed on his face didn't fly past you or Hana.

"Wait a minute," he said to the person on the phone, then took the phone down and pressed it against his chest to speak to you, "you can structure the topic, I'll be with you in five minutes."

You didn't like anything about his tone. It sounded like he was doing you a favor with his presence, like you couldn't do anything without him.

You could only stare after him as he finally stepped out of your room and then paced a little up and down the hall.  
You couldn't take your eyes off him.  
The dark jeans he wore and the red sweater, which sat loosely on his body, completed his style with the protruding hair.  
It was still strange that he was standing in your hallway and in your apartment. He had seen your room, met your cat, looked at your pictures. It all seemed so intimate to you that you couldn't believe it. But you noticed something else. You've been feeling electrified since he was here.

Your heart beat loosely in your chest, as if you were feeling like you were going to have a panic attack.  
You wanted to hate him, you really wanted to. He still triggered goosebumps over your whole body, but at the same time he calmed you down and gave you the feeling that you didn't feel often. You felt proud that he was here.  
One of the most popular guys on your campus was in your apartment, near you, asking for you all the time and ... then it **_clicked_**.

" _Pride_ " you whispered so incredibly quietly that even you barely understood it. It was almost a breath, a little sigh, that had left your lips, but Kuroo's head turned so suddenly that you flinched.  
There was a distance of several meters between you, but the little black in his right eye made sure that he had noticed and confirmed that you were right.

It was really so small that you shouldn't even notice it, but it was there. As if a small black hole had formed in the light eyes that was no bigger than a birthmark.

"I have to hang up, forget the damn rules, they have already been broken. Something is different this time."  
His voice vibrated as he talked and you just noticed that he was hanging up without waiting for an answer. He came back into the room and not once did he take his eyes off you.  
Even when you all sat on the floor and talked about various structure points,  
he hadn't once looked away from you.  
His eyes had wanted to swallow you up, the black in them had vanished again.

_**▪︎♧▪︎** _

Hana had gone to your kitchen after your little meeting came to an end.  
It shouldn't have lasted long because it was a spontaneous meeting and you were still considered _sick_ \- whether it was fake or not.  
Hana had told you often enough that when she and Kuroo were gone, you should have a good rest since you looked visibly tired. She didn't know that it came from the many sleepless nights - one of the reasons for it, right next to you right now.  
She had wanted to serve you the food she had brought you - along with the tea for the cold - before she and Kuroo left. Which caused you to be alone with the tall male.

You had wrapped your arms around yourself and stood a little lost next to the open door.  
When you focused on the sounds in your apartment, you heard Hana humming softly, which she often did when she was alone.  
Kuroo still looked like he couldn't get enough of anything. His eyes picked up every detail in your room and your bad mood didn't seem to bother him.

"You may be fooling Hana," you suddenly spoke, "but not me."  
He turned to you in surprise, his eyebrows raised. He didn't seem to have expected your brisk manner.

"You can no longer mislead me. Your lies may work for others. Like the oh so innocent excuse that Emishi wanted to switch places with you. But I know better."  
A smile formed on his face. The narrow eyes, now even more narrowed. He stroked his dark hair and looked at you with new sparked interest.

"How am I supposed to have forced her? That's what you're accusing me of here, right?"  
The longer you looked at him and couldn't answer him, the ... angrier you got. You got a strange rage that spread to your fingertips. You could only stare at him while the feeling was reflected on your face.  
He cocked his head to one side, crossed his arms over his chest and looked at you long and hard.

"This mesh of innocence, along with your smug manner ... just get on my nerves tremendously," you admitted with a bitterness in your voice that didn't fly past him.  
He immediately closed the distance between you and if you weren't so incredibly angry you would dodge out of the way, but you didn't. You let him come to you, watching him close the door and stand in front of you.  
You had to look up very high to look him in the eyes. From this angle he looked different; more ominous ... darker.  
The big grin was still there and it literally made you simmer.

"Tell me," he spoke, coming a little closer so that you could smell the extremely masculine tart perfume he was wearing, "have you always been so aggressive? That makes me quite jittery."  
His right hand jerked out and found your collar. The long fingers played with the soft fabric of your turtleneck while you continued to stare down at it. His eyes now half closed and still the normal color that really belonged to Kuroo.

"Maybe ... however, Iwaizumi's hands did more damage than I would have liked."  
There was a purr that escaped from his throat. If you hadn't heard it right in front of you, you would have thought it came from Tofu, but the rough voice that followed was just the result of it.

"This is strange," he said. There was a soft growl he made, that flowed and vibrated through your entire body.  
His fingers felt hot against your skin as they quickly tore your turtleneck down. With his head still cocked to the side, he looked at your defaced neck, the hint of a touch hovering over your bruises as he looked carefully at each of them.

"The very fact that Terushima got to you first was reason enough to be next, but when I heard that _your_ Iwaizumi got out of control and was literally tickled out to show you his real face - I was concerned."  
He leaned in, his head right next to yours now. The black hair tickled your face as you felt his breath against your ear.

"Pride," he whispered to you, "Pride will win. It always does. Just imagine the feeling of winning something. That is the essence of pride. Pure, pure pride that flows through your veins."  
Then he stood up straight again, his hand still on your collar, his fingers ghosting over your neck and acting like healing balm on your skin.

"His fingers left a real mark," he said in a louder tone as he examined your neck and you got startled.  
You knew how bad your neck looked, which is why you didn't want to hear it right now.

"Don't touch me," you said between gritted teeth - surprised yourself. If you really wanted to stop his touch, you would, but for some reason you couldn't ... and he knew it.  
His smile widened. You saw the white teeth behind it that flashed out like fangs.

"The kitten always stays a kitten," he laughed, watching your pitiful attempt to raise your arm to push him away. Your own body didn't seem to want to allow that.

"Don't worry, I won't touch you unnecessarily. My playmates have already done you enough damage. That's the thing with pride. You will come yourself. Soon. I'm sure. You will seek me out."

You had wanted to answer when you both noticed how your doorknob was being turned around. He quickly lifted his hand, which was against the door, so that Hana could open the door. At the same moment, you and Kuroo stepped back and moved away from each other.

Hana came in with a tea. Her eyes immediately laid on you and she tried to make out whether something had happened between you and Kuroo.  
After the whole thing with Emishi, even she seemed to find him weird, so she wanted to make sure that nothing had happened during her absence.  
You just looked grumpy, that's exactly how she had left you, which is why she broke into a smile and handed you the tea.

"Your food is in the kitchen, okay? Please eat something so that you can come back to university tomorrow. ”You accepted the cup and breathed out a “ _thank you_ ”.  
Then she turned to Kuroo.

"We should let her rest, don't you think?"

He just nodded, took his jacket, and started to walk after Hana. Before that, however, he turned back to you.

"You should put the pinboard back on," he said, which immediately caused goosebumps to appear on your skin. He puffed at you when you looked at him in shock.

"Did you look into my closet?!", you shouted after him.

"Your theories are very cute. That pink in your closet was unexpected, but extremely welcome. ”  
You stood there - too shocked to move - and just watched him leave your apartment with Hana. His loud laugh could still be heard in the hallway beyond.  
Your cheeks felt very warm.

Half of your body felt the shock that sent a shiver down your spine. He had seen your theories and your little board, which wasn't that important anymore. You had found that you were right. But the other half ... you wanted to sink into the ground.  
The pink he mentioned was, of course, your underwear, which he had apparently looked at long enough to notice the many pink shades and you really didn't know when he had had the time to do so.

"That damn ..."  
You stamped your foot. That idiot.

**_▪︎♧▪︎_ **

The next day you put all your courage together and went back to university.  
It had taken quite a bit of effort, but here you were.  
Hana linked her arm with yours right in the morning and walked around with you before you had to part ways again.  
You wanted to spend your breaks together, so you decided to avoid the cafeteria and meet in one of the common rooms.

She had brought and returned all of the books the boys had collected after you had met _Iwaizumi_.  
You still felt eyes on you though. This time it was a group of girls who either - still - talked about the day in the cafeteria where Oikawa had paid so much attention to you. Others, however, also mentioned Kuroo, who, together with Lev and Bokuto, collected and kept your books before they could be given to Hana.

You chose one of the rooms on the ground floor. It wasn't too big and many students just passed that room with no intention of being there. However, the machines in it were always being used which made the room less lonely.  
A coffee machine and a snack machine were on one of the walls, which is why you immediately felt like having a coffee. The tiredness of the past few days still present.

When you arrived in the common room, the bright natural light from outside made you relax a little. Your shoulders no longer felt tense and you headed for the dark blue chair that stood next to the machine, followed by the table soccer game.

You sighed contentedly, unpacked your notes and sat cross-legged on the little couch in which you immediately sank into.  
Next to you was a sofa that pointed towards the other door - on your right - where you could look out to the campus and see the sports field. It was often used as a shortcut by the many sports students. The glass door was slightly tilted and you watched the many students who were passing by.

Hana and you sent messages back and forth. She sent you funny pictures and made you laugh.  
You had long forgotten why you had come here and preferred to help your friend escape her boring reading.  
After she sent you an edited cat picture, you couldn't suppress your laugh and laughed out loud.  
In response, you wanted to send her a picture of Tofu that you took a few days ago but you heard someone yawn right next to you.  
Your eyes widened and you paused as if petrified.  
Two arms appeared next to you, stretching themselves up on the sofa and shortly afterwards you also saw who they belonged to.  
A very drowsy guy with red, pointy and protruding hair jumped up and looked around the room with his eyes half open.  
Had he slept here? And if he did, did you wake him up?

He had his sportswear on and from the bandages on his fingers you could almost imagine what kind of sport he was doing. After all, the majority at your university did.  
He seemed to have come here after his training and probably hadn't even noticed that he had fallen asleep.  
When he noticed you there was a small grin on his indifferent face.

"Oh my god", you said immediately, "did I wake you up?"  
His thin, long fingers came into your field of vision again and he just dismissed you with a wave of his hand.

"I'm sure they're looking for me anyway" he said, his index finger was under his thin lips to express his thinking.

He heaved himself up. You quickly noticed that he was tall and slim, but flexible, which ensured the posture. He looked a little strange; leaning forward, his arms were on his sides and his head was looking up. In this pose he had something of a bird and the pointy haircut didn't help convince you otherwise.  
His gestures were nimble and smooth, but the manner in which he acted made it look like every movement cost him strength that he was too lazy to put in there.

"You look completely lost," he remarked, pressing his back straight out. His long shape cast a shadow on you. He was now towering over you and you almost felt the need to stand up as well. You felt so subordinate under him that you could only sit and stare at him.  
The eyes still looked like he was going to fall asleep, maybe that was just his usual expression on his face.  
But the grin sent a shiver down your spine.

"The others are pretty tiring, don't you think? A little nap could would help you, too." With his eyelids dropping, he looked briefly out of the window to make sure none of his teammates found him.

"Huh?" He suddenly said, looking at your confused expression. "You don't know what I'm talking about, do you?"  
He blinked.  
And immediately revealed his true self to you. _Light_ _blue_ eyes that weren't there before, now stared at you. They were quite a contrast to the previous dark red eyes. They glittered like little diamonds. With the red hair, the blue eyes looked a lot creepier than they first appeared.

"Iwaizumi is angry with me. He doesn't like my choice."  
He flopped back on the soft couch, leaned back and put his head over the back of the sofa to look at you upside down.

"I'll give you a tip," he said, pointing his finger up, "just don't do anything. You don't have to save them, you know. If you want to win the game "- he blinked again, visibly bored with the glowing blue eye color, and the dark red eyes stared at you again - " then just don't do anything. Trust me."  
He laughed, the sound strangely rough in his throat. His neck was so exposed that you had to stare at it.

"Why are you helping me?", You asked. The concept was foreign to you. You had finally found the seventh candidate who was so willing to help you.

"Isn't it boring when everyone is against you? Just see me as a secret joker. "  
He stuck his tongue out teasingly and took his arms up to shrug his shoulders in his strange pose, which looked incredibly uncomfortable, and then let them dangle behind the back of the sofa.

You were frozen. Could you trust any of them, let alone believe one of his words?  
His eyes suddenly went very wide, he got up and turned so smoothly that it almost looked like a pirouette. The glass door, which had just been tilted, was closed to turn the handle and open it properly.

"Tendou," you heard the voice of another volleyball player, who was now running over to you - with two other boys in his tow. "Here you are."

Tendou gave you a half-hearted smile, cocked his head to the side, so low that you were almost afraid to hear his neck crack.  
His hand snapped up to show them his hand as greeting. A quiet wave that the other three only reflected and imitated.

"We'll play a couple of sets with the younger ones that you like so much."

"Oh, them" said Tendou.

"He can't stand them" said one of the guys at the back, commenting about Tendous so told dislike.

"That's why he won't miss this chance", said the guy at the front again and his eyes sparkled very briefly.

"Yeah, I'm coming" Tendou scratched the back of his head briefly and then turned back to you. "End all of this."

This simple sentence left you stunned.  
It was said so casually, like well-intentioned advice. As if he wanted to give you strength and courage and make you think you had a chance, but something in his voice told you that it was meant differently. And you didn't know if your secret joker wasn't a two-lane joker. You couldn't trust this card, or could you?


	9. heartburn

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter had me like ↑ ← ↓ ↗
> 
> Also i apologise for the long wait. Like I said this fanfic has already eleven chapters out there but it takes me quite long to translate them and i actually start to hate every paragraph after translating it because it seems to be lacking. Anyhoo thanks for all the kudos! Here's the next chapter and I'm hoping to post the next one in a week!

> _**xx where love is missing, you come into play. have you people ever felt love, have you ever felt the caring touch of someone who cares for you? xx** _

  
_Anger is manifested in the individual who spurns love and opts instead for fury. It is also known as Wrath._   
  
_Pride has been called the sin from which all others arise. Also known as Vanity._   
  
_Envy is the desire for others' traits, status, abilities, or situation._   
  
_Gluttony is an inordinate desire to consume more than that which one requires._   
  
_Lust is an inordinate craving for the pleasures of the body._   
  
_Greed is the desire for material wealth or gain._   
  
_Sloth is the avoidance of physical or spiritual work._

**_But stereotypes, stay stereotypes._ **

Your state of being lost had reached almost a month.  
Your hands were still cold. Every day.  
You went to a doctor who prescribed you vitamins and told you to eat healthier because you were missing some important supplements. He took your blood for some tests and contacted you three days later to tell you that there were no abnormalities, so he insisted that you should take various vitamins and watch your health while taking them.  
They didn't help.

He had also spoken to you about your pale face and the dark circles that were so deep that he had prescribed sleeping pills for you. You refused to take them. He assumed there was some kind of insomnia caused by stress, and noted that you weren't the only student who studied too much and slept too little.  
You couldn't tell him why you actually couldn't keep your eyes closed and if you did sleep, then only for four hours at a time.  
So you were accordingly grumpy. Deprivation of sleep put you on edge and in connection with your cold hands, it only made you moodier.  
You took more breaks than usual. When you were at home, you kept going to your bed and under the covers to warm your cold hands and trick your body so that it relaxed a little. Sometimes you fell asleep, but woke up bathed in sweat way too often; your classmates' glowing eyes still burning in your mind.  
Nothing helped against the nightmares and night terrors.

The bruises on your body had faded away; so much that they were almost completely gone.  
They itched from time to time, but you recognized that as a phantom feeling.  
On some days, when everything got too much and it felt like Iwaizumi's hand was still choking you, you could swear you could feel him on your neck.  
Maybe you had a slight trauma, maybe that was normal after such an experience.  
In the end though, nothing was normal anymore, so you couldn't expect to continue living normally.

Nevertheless, you sat in your lecture, Hana right next to you and for a moment everything seemed as it always did.  
You sat at the front and had taken Hana with you. You often did that now; sit at the very front.  
This way you could avoid one of them sneaking into your field of vision, turning to face you, or seeing something that you didn't want to see.  
It worked.  
It got better. But the breaks or the idle time between your lectures were still inconsistent. It was quiet for now.

Now that the seventh and - you hoped - the very last person had revealed itself to you, you couldn't say what your next step was.

The professor said goodbye for this hour and you closed your notebook. You had learned to keep your eyes down, to hunch over and act invisible.  
Honestly, your life was pretty pathetic right now.  
Your existence consisted only of not being seen and not seeing anyone. The only person you looked at was Hana.

Soon it would be a whole month.  
In three days you would have to meet up with Hana and Kuroo. You made a weekly appointment to get work on your presentation and you were already worried about it.  
You sighed as you collected your pens, which caught Hana's attention.

"Everything okay?" - "Everything okay?"  
You looked up with a puzzled look. Hana was mirroring the same look. Together you looked at who had just spoken. Hana and Tendou had asked the same thing at the same time and you were surprised that he was here at all. You could no longer say for sure who attended the same lectures as you. You didn't look around anymore.  
He stood right behind you. A mischievous smile on your lips.

"Gotcha~" he said to Hana, who had just wanted to say something but closed her mouth again. She decided to play along for a few seconds and remained silent. 

"Are you hungry?" He asked, standing between you and Hana and urging you to leave. The question also included Hana, but it was clearly aimed at you. He looked at you but didn't wait for an answer. "I feel like eating Shio ramen soup ... or maybe Tonkotsu?"  
Everything happened so quickly, you could hardly complain that he was now walking beside you as if he were doing it every day. As if you were friends for years.

"You can talk again by the way" he said now to Hana and a low laugh escaped him. "We should go eat ramen together, what do you think? I know the best restaurants."  
Beside you, the long, lanky Satori caught your eye. Glances followed you through the class, then through the corridor, where you still walked alongside.

"Are there any fancy vegetarian dishes?" Hana's interest was piqued. She was wrapped around his little finger so quickly that you could only stare at her. 

"Ah" he said and his eyes, which were already close to closing, were getting smaller, "I see you like the special things ... me too!"  
He seemed to be getting jittery because of Hana's preference and put his hands high up in the air.  
As you kept walking, you tried to get the upper hand and decide the direction you should go to.  
The many windows next to you should relax you, but the longer you walked together, the greater the desire to disappear behind a closed door and avoid him. You stared out into the bright sky and hoped he would leave soon, but your heart was pounding in your chest so hard that you grimaced.

You rubbed your cold hands. Your body seemed to be losing temperature as his body was gaining temperature. A heat emanated from him that you felt on the right side of your body. It was so strong that you were almost convinced that he was about to go up in flames.

You saw his lips move. His head was turned to Hana, who listened with a smile and chimed along with his speech occasionally. The words seemed to fly over your head and only came muffled to your ears. You couldn't make out any scraps of words.  
You tried to focus on something else. Maybe the little lint that stuck to his dark jacket.

No, that made you want to extend your hand and want to remove it.  
Your whole body worked at full speed. You were over-sensitive, susceptible to any change that came from him and yet you couldn't take your eyes off him.

It was only when his head turned forward that you could bring yourself up to follow his gaze. He had lifted his hand, one of his famous silent waves again, in which he didn't move his hand. This time, though, a "Hey" followed up that wave of his and you got startled.  
You wanted to know who he was greeting; your curiousity got the better of you and before you were able to make out any other students, your eyes met the ones you were already so familiar with seeing. The other six of the bunch that you tried to avoid at all cost and who you now walked past by.

It happened so quickly.  
And there was already a good distance between you as you saw them become smaller and smaller.  
They had been standing in the hallway, nothing out of the ordinary. There were a lot of students in the hallway near the next lectures, but the fact that you would see them in a heap while you were with Tendou, who greeted them in such a nonchalant way, made you shiver.  
You hadn't recognized much. You could make out one or the other facial expression, but you passed them so quickly that you couldn't believe how easy it was to get away from them.

You swallowed hard.  
The back of Tendou's hand brushed yours and you gasped. You pulled your hand back and rubbed the spot he had touched. It felt like hot wax had been poured onto your skin, which was now starting to cool, the further the distance between your hands were.

The three of you turned around the corner where you looked briefly over your shoulders. Your shoulders stiffened - a paranoia following you.  
You paused so that the two finally came to a halt.  
Your heart contracted painfully and you gasped before they could turn to you.  
Tendou first noticed that you were no longer next to them and he turned to face you. His head was slightly tilted to the right, while he was looking at you. Something in his eyes dangerously alerting. The smile had changed to a mysterious grin.

"I have to go there" you said, pointing to the right. "Hana are you not coming?"  
She didn't seem to notice the faint begging undertone in your voice and said no.

"I have a free period", she informed you.  
The red-haired volleyball player continued to look at you.  
That look seemed calculating.

"I would advise you not to go there," he said in a low voice. He didn't mean to scare you away but you had to come with him. You had to.

"Huh", made Hana, who turned back to him to ask, "why not?"  
Your ears began to ring, the words sounded muffled again. His eyes on you promised that you would regret that something would happen if you went there. Hana didn't seem to understand the ambiguous meaning, anyway, she didn't know what was happening between you two.  
Maybe he wanted to save you from chaos, but even if he tried to help you, you felt anything but safe.

Your hands were starting to burn.  
They were hot and you almost feared that they would swell up.  
You looked down at them and saw them tremble. Your hands were hot and trembled. This was far from normal. Your whole body seemed confused.   
Your heart beat faster. You were panicking.

Then a large hand came into view and intertwined with your own.  
Tendou's chest was right in front of your face and you had to look up to look him in the red orbs that eyed you with interest.  
Hana drew in a sharp breath and before you could blink, his hand was gone and you felt your hands grow colder again.  
For some reason that was inexplicable to you, you had the desire to nestle against him, throw your arms around his neck so that he could hug your so anxious body and sway you into safety. That was incredibly atypical for you and it would be for him too, but ... you felt an attraction. That strange attraction that you felt when one of them was near you.  
The same attraction that carried you back to this building, which you couldn't stay away from because your heart contracted and longed for something you didn't understand yet.

You took a step back and gave him the sign he was waiting for.  
You nodded.  
"Okay", you said reluctantly, "off to the cafeteria we go."

_**▪︎ ♧ ▪︎** _

  
Your table was way too big and too empty for Tendou's choice to be just a coincidence.  
There were so many free tables, but purposefully went to this one - that you were sure of.  
You couldn't fight it anymore. You could hardly speak.  
You tried everything to regain control of your feelings that were completely out of control.

He was sitting right next to you, where he had casually stretched out his legs and arms and you were trying to make yourself as small as possible as to not touch him.  
His leg brushed against yours again and again and you swallowed hard each time and tried not to show how much it worked you up.  
Hana was sitting on the other side of you and the two were having a good time chatting, while you were caught inbetween their laughters and topics.  
The redhead was just talking about his team, which was still one of the unbeatable ones on campus and you listened half-heartedly as you gazed around the cafeteria.

You seemed to go up in flames from within. It was an inexplicable feeling. The question of whether Tendou felt that way was forgotten when you saw the same group come in that you just saw in the hallway.  
Tendou seemed to notice immediately that they were here. He stopped talking abruptly, made a comforting sound, that sounded quite strained coming from his throat and turned towards the door, where he quickly waved the group over to him.  
Hana drew in a sharp breath when she saw Kuroo at the front, who approached your table with a smug grin.  
Should you make up an excuse, get up and go? Perhaps from close up you could finally uncover the remaining sins, which had taken over your classmates.  
You couldn't make a decision because Satori's hand found your thigh and settled there.   
A little startled, you turned your head in his direction.  
His eyes looked straight into yours. They seemed to look so deeply, that one might think he was set to uncover your deepest secrets.  
You swallowed hard.

Your hand found his and you quickly pressed your fingernails into the back of his hand - hoping he would let go of you.  
He didn't, no matter how hard you pressed into his skin and tried to push his hand away, it didn't move.  
You leaned forward to him; the gesture mirrored Kuroos yesterday when he whispered in your ear and you briefly shivered.

"This is how you want to win over my trust?" You asked in a low voice. "You are on the wrong path."  
The corners of his mouth rose slightly up, but the bored look that was a standart for him took on something dark.  
You felt the pressure on your thigh disappear and he innocently put his hands up and looked surprised.

"I'm innooooceeent" he sang, setting them down on the table to rest his head on his hands. "See, I do what you say."  
He looked at you with his eyes almost closed. Now that he was supporting his head, he seemed to accept the tiredness he was constantly feeling and not fight against it. There was a cloudy wind in the air, almost reminiscent of cozy hours in the morning and increasing the urge to stay in bed to cuddle with someone.  
You didn't know if he had the power to let the tension in the air fizzle out so easily, but it was strange. Very strange.

You wanted to start speaking but were interrupted before you could start.  
Lev's tall figure towered between you and Tendou and you had to look up to see his face.  
Immediately behind him Oikawa came into view as well, who was standing there with his arms crossed in front of his chest and looking at you and Lev. The envy flashed in his eyes, you could see it with ease.  
It got a little too wild for the tall half-Japanese, so he extended his big hand like a claw and put it on Tendou's shoulder. You observed him doing this and noticed that his fingers barely noticeably bored into the shoulder of the redhead, whose mouth formed an O. He laughed out loud, but it didn't seem to be something he actually found funny. He didn't object though and sat in the chair next to his previous one. He immediately rested his head on his hands again and watched the situation unfold.

Lev sat down in Tendou's previous chair, turned his whole body towards you and looked at you with a grin that looked like he was concocting something. The almond-like eyes didn't help, just seemed to make him look more mysterious than he already was.  
Tendou's red hair appeared behind Lev, who had to push his back out to see over Lev's shoulder.  
You found that kind of amusing.

"What were you guys whispering to eachother a moment ago?" Lev asked briskly, without thinking about whether he wasn't too direct about it.  
You couldn't see Tendou's facial expression, just the pointy hairstyle that moved behind Lev and you almost laughed.

"Huh," you said and looked over at Hana to find out if she found all of this here as strange as you.  
But when you turned to her, you only noticed that Oikawa had somehow got her to sit in another chair, which is why he now sat down beside you. A smile on his jealous face that made you frown, upon seeing it.

Before you knew it, the other boys had taken a seat on your table too.  
Kuroo sat next to Tendou and Bokuto next to him. Beside him was Terushima, who winked at you when you looked at him. Iwaizumi was the only one who preferred to stand and turn his back to you.  
You stared at him for a while, and even if you were sure that he felt it, he didn't budge. He was frozen in place and paid no attention to you.

"Oh, ignore Iwa-chan~" said Oikawa after following your gaze, "he likes to sulk."  
The nickname briefly reminded you of the time before all of this happened. You had always heard Oikawa call the name through the hallway, which made Iwaizumi kind of grumpy.  
Now he seemed to feel the same way, but you saw the tense shoulders that he had barely lifted after Oikawa called him that.

"Oh, keep going, he'll explode." Kuroo exclaimed.

"Who cares?" Terushima asked and shrugged.

"I'm hungry," Bokuto said, stroking his apparently empty stomach.

"So" Lev whispered now that he was sure that not everyone was listening, "you guys are going to have dinner later?"  
He looked at Tendou, who blinked briefly and said yes.  
You didn't really agree, but you didn't think you had a say in that.

"I want to join" Lev announced. "We can also do something afterwards. What do you think?"  
He looked at you with hopeful eyes. You paused.

"Are you ...", you started, "... uhh ..."  
You didn't want Hana to hear anything, even if you were sitting between Lev and Oikawa, who seemed to be getting closer and closer. The closer Lev got, the closer Oikawa came, who instinctively acted out of envy and who hardly noticed that he almost sat on your lap.  
He looked at Iwaizumi. Oikawa would be lying, if he said, he wasn't kind of worried in a way.  
But every time he looked over to Lev and saw that he had come closer to you, he had to do the same.  
That's when it _clicked_.  
 _Envy_ and _Greed_.

"Oh" Lev said, patting your head as if stroking an obedient dog, "have you finally figured it out?"  
He gave you a smile that reached his eyes.

"Don't touch her like that" Oikawa said. The undertone in his voice outraged, his lips pushed forward as if he were about to sulk. "She's not a dog, Lev"

"But she's so cute." said the giant, whose hand covered your entire head.  
You sighed and pushed his entire arm away from you. He just laughed, your reaction seemed to amuse him.  
HIs hands fell into his lap.  
The way he rubbed the hand that had just touched your head didn't fly past you.  
Even under the table and in his lap, his hand was still clenching into a loose fist, trying to remember the way how soft you had felt.

"You guys are so fucked" Iwaizumi suddenly said, who had finally turned to you and was now staring you down. His eyes burned into yours, as if you were the only person left on the table. 

"Then leave", Kuroo sighed, "you don't have to be here."

"He was never popular with the girls," Oikawa whispered to you, which is why Iwaizumi snorted annoyed and seemed to waver if he should just leave.

"If you go", said Bokuto, who just couldn't sit still, "who's going to stop me from taking a bite, though!?"  
He pointed his finger at you and your mouth remained wide open.

"What the hell are you talking about?" You asked, a little too loud as some students turned to you.

"Did you hear that, Kuroo?" He cried, holding his stomach, "what the _hell_ are we talking about?"

"You're really not you when you're hungry," said the black-haired man, but had a big grin on his face. You were irritated.

"Are you advertising something?" Terushima took turns looking at the two and shook his head at them.

"Hey ... hey ... HEY!" Bokuto pushed the plastic chair aside and stood with one leg on it. "We're here for a reason."

"If you continue to draw so much attention to us, we will no longer be able to explain that very reason" Kuroo patted his friend on the back and pulled him back into his chair, where he sat down again - a little jitterily.

"Hana" Oikawa spoke to your friend in a sweet voice, "could you leave us alone for a few minutes?"  
Hana didn't answer, instead she immediately looked at you to read your expression.

It was simple.  
You were in public, in the midst of your classmates, where there was nothing they could do, especially as such a large group that attracted attention anyway. They wouldn't pull off anything strange and you thought you needed this upcoming conversation. Whatever happened, both sides needed answers.  
So you nodded to her and gave her the sign that assured you that you'd be okay.

"Okay," she said, "I'll be back there at Nakamura's table, if you need anything."  
She pointed to a table further away where Nakamura and some other girls were sitting. Their eyes literally fixated on this table.

She left you alone and Iwaizumi finally seemed to snap back from his stiffness.  
He went around and took a seat next to Oikawa, where Hana had been sitting mere seconds ago.  
He didn't look at you and leaned back with his arms crossed, staring into the air, all serious.

"Before we start" - Tendou suddenly announced - "I want to make sure that I understand this correctly. We all want to throw each other in front of the bus now? "

"Do you call it that?" Kuroo looked at him with an unreadable look. "Didn't you tell her not to do anything to win this? You decided to shit on the rules the second you selected and searched her out. "  
That seemed to fuel Iwaizumi's anger, which was already always present. After all, he was not discreet about disliking their choice of victim.

The redhead, on the other hand, raised his arms soothingly as if to testify to his innocence.

“We all know that I'm passive about this game. I am her best chance at winning. ”

"You can't really trust him" Oikawa now said. The brown eyes had taken on a sharp edge, as if he were about to attack Tendou and snap at him. "He is laziness in person."

"Oh" you said. _Oh, indeed._  
That made sense. So he wanted you to do nothing. Oikawa had just confirmed that he was the sin of _sloth_ after all.

"If you don't do anything, he'll win the game," Lev said beside you, never taking your eyes off you.

"What's this game all about", your curiosity went through the roof and it didn't help that they mentioned it so often. You were fed up. You wanted answers. An explanation. Anything.

There was a brief silence. They all seemed to be thinking the same thing and you hardly dared to speak.

Then you heard a loud bang, followed by a squeak and you started up in terror.

Iwaizumi had pushed his chair back and had risen up.   
You noticed how hard it was for him to pull himself together and you trembled slightly.

"Who do you think you are, that you ask us this question? Fuck this goddamn conversation. If you guys think you can win the game this way, you're dumber than I thought.”

His eyes now had a hint of red in them. A shimmer of red that you only recognized when light shone on it.

He grabbed Oikawa's t-shirt sleeve, lifting him up to his feet and started to drag him with him.

"Well... that's it, I guess. There will be no conversation, I suppose.", said Tendou casually. He braced himself against the table to stand up. "The dinner later still stands."

And before you could answer, he was already staggering after Iwaizumi, who had left the cafeteria with Oikawa in tow.

No matter where this conversation should have gone, you still managed to tie some pieces of the puzzle together.

Especially since you could now assign every sin.

Pride belonged to Kuroo, Lust to Terushima and Wrath to Iwaizumi. Envy was in Oikawa, Greed in Lev, Sloth in Tendou, and Bokuto's hungry eyes assured you that gluttony was his.


	10. malfunction

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a special thanks to my best friend who helped me with proof reading!!!  
> This one and the next chapter will be quite long and dark.  
> I asked my german readers if theyre okay with a filler chapter after the 11th chapter, which will be kind of just fun and positive and just uwu i guess??? I hope you guys don't mind a filler chapter which is turning quite fun to write. There will be a lot of characters we love and haven't met in my fanfic yet! So I'm excited for that!!
> 
> I finished translating this chapter faster than i thought so hope u guys enjoy.

> _**xx i can't handle rejection, you make me want to tear myself apart. your love is like cherry pie and im allergic to cherry. xx** _

You gently stroked the page of the book you had finished reading and flipped to the next page thoughtfully.  
The library seemed quieter than usual.  
The smell of books was pleasant, even if the dusty corners made your nose tickle. You just wanted to pretend that it was as romantic and cozy as it was in movies, but the many students at the other tables somehow did everything they could to prevent that imagination.

A boy was sitting at the next table, with a dripping nose and coughing fits that plagued him every two seconds. You felt pity for him. The finals were close, so you couldn't blame him for wanting to study, whether he was healthy or sick.  
At the table to your left were several girls who were constantly peering over to your table and whispering to themselves. Unfortunately, there was no cliché-like library staff who would sneak up on the group and silence them with a finger pressed onto her lips.  
You just hoped that their irritating whispering attempts would soon be successful.  
It didn't help that you were sitting at a table with Hana _and_ Kuroo to gather the necessary information for your upcoming presentation.

The black-haired boy had actually suggested studying at his home, which you had denied immediately and had come up with the idea of studying in the library.  
You didn't have to talk to each other here, but you had forgotten how busy it was right after the weekends.

You were rubbing your temples thoughtfully - while also feeling a little annoyed - trying to decipher the next lines. You had already read this paragraph three times and when you got to the last sentence and finally understood what you were reading, a pen was thrown at you.

It hit you on the forehead, then it fell into your book and laid there innocently.

You blinked in confusion and might have gotten around, pretending that it never happened, if you weren't hit by another pen. This time dangerously close to your right eye and your gaze shot up to glare at the culprit.  
You might have succeeded looking a little intimidating, if you weren't hit by a paper ball on the nose.  
Laughter came from the girls-only table and you cursed quietly.  
A grinning Kuroo was looking at you.

"Sorry," he said quickly, when he saw how angry you were, "the paper ball came just when I thought you were still ignoring me."

"What do you want?" You practically hissed at him and Hana, who had just been watching the two of you, looked back down at her notes. She decided not getting involved. "Can‘t you see that I'm trying to read something?"

"You call that reading?" He asked, skillfully ignoring your words. "You've been staring at that page for minutes now."

"Oh," you said, "I'm sorry! I didn't know I had to tell you which pages I was having trouble with. ”

"Not that, but..." he cocked his head to the side and your gaze wandered briefly to the black, protruding hair, which now fell a little more on his forehead, "... I can‘t help but worry, if you are in such a bad mood."

You looked at him for a long time. Then you sighed.

After talking to all seven ... something had changed.  
Satori was hanging out with you and Hana more often, who was pleased with his presence. He always made her laugh and told her the best restaurants he had visited. At first you were reluctant to go, or you changed directions when you saw him coming towards you, but now ... you just let him. You let him walk around with you, you let him eat with you or even chat with you between breaks. Since that day in the lounge when you woke him up, he had never again revealed his glowing eyes to you, neither tickled them out to scare you. They didn't come out by chance if he did something that was extremely ... sluggish or lazy, either. It was strange. So was he.

With Satori, however, came Lev, who would love to take up every second of your time. And with Lev came Oikawa, who didn't like that Satori was always with you anyway. He was jealous when they spent too much time with you. He was jealous when a boy who wasn't one of the seven looked at you and he was even jealous of Hana, who you obviously were always with.  
Terushima tried to get closer to you, too and even though Iwaizumi seemed to have a grudge against you, he prevented the blond boy from getting too close to you. At first you disregarded it as a coincidence and you also didn't know how much of it was Iwaizumi's actual personality, which was present when the being in him switched off for a day, or how often the angry being prevented Terushima from coming near you. In the end you were happy because you didn't know what you would do if he caught you alone again.

Otherwise, Iwaizumi didn't speak a word to you, but also seemed to be holding Bokuto in check, who always looked at you as if you were something to eat. He seemed to prey upon you, when he thought you weren‘t looking. It gave you goosebumps and his round, bright eyes, which were very similar to the orange of which you were so afraid of, constantly evoked an instinct in you that advised you to stay away.

Another pen came flying towards you, which hit you at your hairline, ricocheted off and rolled down the table.

"Stop dreaming," Kuroo said, pushing his chair closer to yours.

"Stop throwing shit at me. That hurts."  
He raised an arm, ready to throw a highlighter next, but he took off the cap beforehand and your eyes widened.  
You definitely didn't want to run around with pink streaks on your face.

"I swear to you", you said with a threatening undertone, "if you do that, I'll go straight home."  
It was just an empty threat. You couldn't afford to go home and miss this study session, but it seemed to work. Something flashed briefly in Kuroo's eyes, making his light eyes look black for a millisecond.  
He put the cap back on and seemed to have changed his mind.

"Okay, save the empty threats for someone else." He said and was now staring at you with an intensity that made you quite dizzy.

You looked back down and pushed the two pens away to pick up reading where you left off.  
Truthfully, everything was so messed up right now that you couldn't concentrate.

It didn't help that Kuroo, who was too popular and too handsome, sat right across from you and kept looking at you. It was also partly the unfamiliar attention from guys you never would have expected in life.  
You weren't the one to rave about a lot, but it was no secret that these volleyball players were quite goodlooking. Since Kuroo was by far one of the most popular guys on campus, you couldn't ignore him.

You had often watched them play during the summer when you had free periods and wanted to copy notes, but they had never really paid any attention to you. You wouldn't have wanted that anyway, but it was definitely unfamiliar to have the attention of various popular guys at once.  
The inexplicable attraction you felt was still there, which made things much more difficult and complicated.

Your cold hands hadn't improved, either. Sometimes it got uncomfortable if you wrote for too long. Even holding a pen became a challenge. You had to take breaks again and again, rub your hands together and then continue writing.  
It was no different at the moment. When you were reading a page, you were rubbing your hands together at the same time, usually under the table, so that nobody could see it. And when you had to turn the page, you hardly felt the surface of the paper under your fingers.

Nevertheless, it was quite pleasant and warm in your chest.  
The uncomfortable feeling that you had to suffer when you left the campus was not there at the moment.

Your bulletin board now had several pieces of paper on it and you remembered one that could explain the following situation.  
Somehow the seven boys and you were connected. In what aspects exactly and why or how in general, were still unanswered questions, but you could safely assume that this connection was with all seven of them.

When you looked up for a moment, you noticed - as always - the bright eyes of Kuroo on you, his right leg trembling under the table. He had his right arm on the open book and didn't seem to be able to concentrate. There was a small crooked smile on his face that was only aimed at you.  
You winced and immediately looked down again.  
Your heart was pounding in your chest and your hands suddenly felt so much colder than they did seconds ago.  
You stared at the next lines. Ignoring his eyes on you, you tried to continue where you had stopped.

Just when your concentration reached its peak and you were working on two pages and taking notes - at a record pace! - the boy at the next table fell into a coughing fit that lasted several minutes.  
You grimaced and as if the universe was on your back, doing all that on purpose, the girls started talking about Kuroo just when the boy finally stopped coughing.

"Just talk to him," said the one who held a magazine in front of her face so that you probably wouldn't hear it as loud as you already did.

"I did yesterday, it's your turn today" she replied, pointing to another girl.  
Hana gently slapped her forehead with her hand, visibly tense.

"Honestly," she whispered to you, which also reached Kuroo, "why is everyone so loud today?"

"Maybe we should study alone again and exchange ideas and notes next week," you suggested.

"No," it came directly from Kuroo, "we can-"  
He didn't get to finish his sentence.  
His eyebrows furrowed together and he let out a painful groan as if someone had just hurt him terribly bad.  
His hand went to his forehead, where he tried to massage his temples, but winced again in pain.  
You looked at him in shock.

"Are you okay?" You asked, confused. He was obviously not feeling well, but it came so suddenly that you didn't know what to do.  
The girls at the next table now rose; becoming awefully aware of his painful condition due to the now hunched over shape of his body.

"Oh my god!“ One of them said and Hana startled up to look at him in a better angle. _What happened?_  
His hand covered most of his face.  
And just as everyone was forming a circle around him, he looked at you through different strands of hair.

His eyes were pitch black and faintly glowing, just like that day in the lecture when you had seen it for the very first time.

Then he closed them again.  
He got up so quickly that some girls backed away to make some room for him.  
You copied him.  
Your instincts took over and you swallowed hard.  
With his free hand he grabbed at you, pulled your now frozen shape to himself and bored his fingers into your upper arm.

"Get me out of here," he whispered to you as you clashed into him with flushed cheeks.  
Everyone's eyes were on you and you wanted to sink into the ground, but the panic in you seemed to be acting up.  
Your legs took a few steps before you even realized that you had started walking.  
You bumped into some girls who were too close, then against a pushed-out chair and finally against the edge of the neighboring table and had to be careful that Kuroo didn't do that too.  
He was clawing at your arm like a cat, who was afraid to drown.  
His head was hanging down and he didn't even dare to open his eyes. He trusted you blindly.  
And you obeyed. You strayed a little, careful enough not to clash with others, but you already had the attention of the entire library on you.

Whenever you had to avoid someone or step to the right or left, Kuroo's hard chest hit your back, which is why he tightened his grip on you. He came closer, the touch almost seemed to illuminate you.  
Your back burned every time he bumped into you. Your upper arm as well, where his long fingers would leave a mark, you were sure of that.  
Your heart was beating almost all over your body and you felt so many emotions at the same time that you might have fainted right then and there, but you made it out.

With a lot of back and forth, you arrived in the hallway, where you closed the big door behind you and looked around immediately.  
Some students stood around and turned around to you. Your panicked shape, the pale face and the hectic ups and downs of your chest signaled that something was going on, but nobody knew whether you could be helped and if so how?  
Kuroo was now leaning against the wall, his eyes still closed, but his hands now on his thighs to support his weak body.  
You could only look at him while he could hardly breathe.

"I'm going to get someone ... I'm going to look for the others!" You exclaimed, completely distraught.  
You stood right in front of him to take the others' view of him.  
He shook his head.  
More hair fell into his forehead and you could only look at him helplessly.

"Kuroo!" You called and his head shot up immediately. The black eyes now staring at you. A glow in them that scared you and chilled you to the bones.  
A glowing ring that encircled his entire iris was there and seemed to shake and vibrate.  
It was almost mesmerizing how the bright ring trembled and danced on the black iris.  
As if two pieces of coal were burning.

"Damn ..." He said, taking a deep breath. "This damn host."  
A shiver ran down your spine every time you heard them talking about their hosts. It was such a strange concept.  
His _pride_ was hurt.  
He never wanted to ask for your help. But he had done that now and he started cursing under his breath.

"Shit," came a loud voice behind you.  
You already knew who it belonged to.  
Bokuto came running to the aid of his closest friend.  
The black and white haired player looked at you briefly and noticed your presence, only to then look at Kuroo, who had lowered his eyes again.

"This is new, huh," he said next to you and didn't seem to be waiting for Kuroo's answer.

"My eyes," said the black-haired male and Bokuto understood. He always understood.

"I have to take you to Satori," he said, and Kuroo wanted to say no again. He hated to accept someone's help, but he knew that this was not something he could solve on his own.

"Is Iwaizumi here?" Kuroo asked. There was concern in his tone. That was unexpected.  
Bokuto just shook his head and stood next to Kuroo on the wall to support him if necessary.  
The black-haired man leaned directly against Bokuto, whose muscular arms wrapped around his friend's shoulders. Kuroo's arm was on Bokuto's shoulders and with his help, he was able to take a few steps forward.  
He was still cursing under his breath and before they were out of your sight, Bokuto turned again, giving you a big grin.

When they were finally gone, the tension in your body really became noticeable.  
You tried to relax, to release the tension in your shoulders, hands and face, but it wasn‘t easy.  
You stepped back into the library, where there was a different kind of silence than usual.  
At the sight of you, the girls immediately rushed towards you.

"Is Kuroo okay?"

"Where is he?"

"What happened to him?"  
Before you could answer all the many questions, you fell into the cliché that you had been looking out for earlier, as you put your index finger in front of your mouth and made "Shhh" loudly.  
The bunch of students in front of you looked puzzled but remained quiet, so you went back to your table, where Hana was watching you with eyes wide open.

"What ... was ... all that about?" She asked, seeming incredibly confused.

"I have no idea,“ you replied honestly and then turned to the others.

"Kuroo is doing well, apparently he has not eaten enough and had a little migraine. Nothing big. You can probably ask him later yourself,” you clarified as best as possible.  
That was the most harmless excuse you could come up with so spontaneously.  
Hana looked at you a little doubtfully, but you didn't think she would question you, if you didn't start talking on your own.

**_▪︎ ♧ ▪︎_ **

  
During your lunch break, which you certainly deserved to have after all that chaos, you were a bit lost until you recognized someone who, for once, was not in front of his cell phone.  
It was Kenma, who you knew was one of Kuroo's closest friends.  
He had looked around for you, very atypical for the otherwise quiet Kenma, who was often dragged along by Kuroo to play volleyball. You saw him in many of your courses since you were in the same semester. In addition, he wasn‘t a regular player and always preferred to sit quietly in a corner and spend his time on his cell phone. So he didn't stand out for many, but even more so for you, because you could see yourself in him.  
He had tied his long hair into a bun that hung loosely down and when he saw you he came running to you.

"Hi," he said in a muffled voice.  
He didn't look you straight in the eye, but seemed to be trying.

"Hey," you replied, slowing down so that he could keep up with you without appearing to want to go anywhere.

"I heard about Kuroo," he said, and you just nodded, letting him know that he could continue without you interrupting him, "he doesn't answer any of my texts and I don't know where he is. Everyone is talking about what happened. "  
You tried to swallow the frog in your throat. The explanations and excuses you usually had were disappearing in your mind. 

"If you see him, can you please tell him to answer me?"  
You nodded immediately.

"I'm sorry," you told him and didn't really know why. Kenma seemed troubled about way more than just Kuroo's sudden poor health.  
He shook his head.

"No, it's all right," he scratched his head briefly and didn't seem to know how to properly express the next words, "well, I know he's ... interested in you or something. So he's been a little weird for a month now, but ... thank you for taking care of him."  
You could see how much it had cost him to overcome his usual passive behaviour.  
You really wondered what kind of changes Kuroo went through, for even his friends noticing it. So far as to searching you out and doing completely uncharacteristic things because they couldn't get through him.

This reinforced your theories - well, some of them.  
Not only were they strange to you, even their closest friends noticed that there was something off about them.

You sighed.

You felt sorry for Kenma. You wish you could explain to him that it wasn't him, nor was it you.  
What if you would...  
Would everyone deem you crazy? Especially if you went around telling people that the most popular boys on campus were used as hosts - like a bad horror movie. You didn't even want to imagine how ridiculous that would sound outloud.  
But most of all ... you were afraid of the boys' reactions. What would they do if you were walking around trying to convince people to believe you? Even imagining Iwaizumi‘s fury made you afraid.

"I'll tell him when I see him, I promise. I think ... if I may say that ... that he isn't intentionally ignoring you or anything. Bokuto was with him and I think he just had a really bad day."  
Kenma gave you a tiny smile that immediately put a smile on your face. You saw him smile so rarely that it hit you harder.

"Thank you,“ he said.  
When you wanted to inform him that he should maybe stop by the nursery, an arm suddenly wrapped around your shoulders and pressed you against a muscular body.  
You were so close to the person that all you had to do was turn your head a little to the right to see who it was.  
Bokuto's smile almost blinded you and he greeted Kenma just as enthusiastically.  
His eyebrows shot up as he spoke in a loud voice.

"Kenma!" Bokuto called, who flinched at the volume. "If you're looking for Kuroo, he went home."  
You tried to wriggle out of his iron grip, but it was a pitiful attempt.

"If you would excuse us," he said to Kenma, and was already strolling away with you as you kept trying to escape.  
Then you remembered his words from the cafeteria, asking if Iwaizumi wasn‘t there, who would stop him ... and then Kuroo's question today ... if Iwaizumi was here. Bokuto had said no.  
Panic crept up inside you.

"I have another lecture, let go of me."   
You didn't know where this courage, willpower and struggle came from. Or maybe you had gotten used to the touch, so that it could no longer cloud your thoughts and you could say what you truly felt.

"Hey ... hey," he said, looking at you with round eyes, "I just want to talk to you. Come on."  
You wanted to laugh contemptuously, but watched him bow his head to put it in the free space between your shoulder and your neck. Your entire body stiffened.  
His hair tickled your neck barely noticeably, the heat coming from him made you sweat.  
His grip on you loosened up, but this gesture got you so confused hat you could hardly move.  
His forehead laid flat against your neck, right under your ear, where he snuggled up against you as if he was afraid someone would come and try to separate you and take you away from him.

"You smell so ... good," he said in a deep voice. A croak in it that made the hairs on your neck rise up.  
You no longer knew how long you had stayed like this and walked side by side, but eventually you arrived in the second lounge, which was at the other end of the building.  
He went inside with you and was quite happy to find only two other students there. He dropped down onto one of the sofas that stood in the middle of the room. The hand that was still holding you stroked your entire arm and now laid in your hand, where he intertwined his fingers with yours and pulled you towards him.  
His hand was exactly like Terushima's.  
Warm, so incredibly warm.

Your hand, which was now in his, no longer felt cold. Instead, you were electrified again. Your body wanted to melt away and you needed all kinds of self-control not to give into his touch.  
You flopped down next to him on the couch, where he approached you again.

"It shouldn't feel so good," he said. His eyes staring at your neck. "Nothing should."

"Where's Kuroo?" You asked, hoping to avert the subject from you.

"You did this to him," he said, laughing loudly against your neck, where his breath tickled you and you instinctively put your head to one side, hoping to avoid it from tickling again.  
But he stopped you. His hand positioned itself under your chin and his fingers carefully brushed your cheeks so that he could put your head on the other side and stop you if you should move again.  
He didn't squeeze hard. His fingers didn't hurt your cheeks. On the contrary, he was so incredibly gentle that it looked like genuine kindness.

"What do you mean?" You asked. "I didn't do anything."

"Of course you don't know that, but ..."  
He let go of you, pressed his body against the back of the sofa and put both arms on it. He had spread himself so much that you made yourself a little smaller so as not to get in his way.  
The familiar grin was still on his face. His eyebrows shot up, made the curved shape stand out even more, the eyes now looked even bigger.  
He looked briefly at one of the vending machines facing you two, but decided to turn back to you.  
The yellow in his eyes seemed to switch back and forth. Light, dark, light, dark and you already knew that if you blinked, it would turn to a glowing orange.

"Guys," he called suddenly, and the other two students turned to you. "Could you leave us alone?"  
It was that almost lascivious expression where a hunger lurked that made the two ask no questions.  
One smiled barely noticeably, looked at Bokuto first and then at you.  
The other seemed to think the same ... maybe it was Bokuto's intimidating tone that convinced the stranger to listen to the popular volleyball player, but they made a move to leave the room.

"You ... you really don't need to leave. You don't bother us! ”You called after them before they could really leave the room.  
Bokuto's body moved again and you felt his arm snake around your shoulders.  
The hand that now found your shoulder pressed into your skin and it acted as a silent warning.  
You hardly dared to look at him.

"See you guys around," he said. A clear sign that he had the last word. And they obeyed. They left the room.  
You felt the sofa sink further under you as you felt him coming closer, as if you weren't already looking like a pair of lovers who couldn't take their hands off of eachother.  
And as he got closer to your neck, you might have thought that you were just another couple who had found each other on campus and were now exchanging lovely words.  
If you narrowed your eyes, one might not even notice your completely distraught expression.  
If you let in the feeling that was in the back of your head, you might not be afraid anymore.

Your bodies felt a heat that was out of this world. It wasn't a hot, sexual allusion, no, it was like your skin was on fire.  
Your hands felt disadvantaged and you would like to feel the same warmth that you were able to feel earlier, but Bokuto had other ideas. They always had.

His thumb brushed lightly over your bare skin, where he now clamped any strands of stray hair behind your ear to fixate on your neck, undisturbed.  
He took the time to stroke your sensitive skin right under your ear where you could swear he was trying to find an artery.  
Your head was turning; you felt dizzy and your mind was foggy.  
The air around you seemed to press down on you. It was difficult to breathe. He smelled sweet, like cotton candy.  
His breath tickled your ear again, but you knew better than to block his view to your neck.

"It is different. All of this here. Those feelings that come up when we touch ... they should be one-sided. You should feel them. ”- Some kind of low growl was escaping his throat. - "We shouldn't. We shouldn't feel anything. "  
You stared straight ahead. It was difficult to get any word out anyway, but you wanted to question it, you wanted answers.

"Ah," it just came from you when he briefly exerted pressure on your neck. It wasn't painful, but you feared it a lot more when it was a gentle touch.

"What did you do with Kuroo? What happened to him?” Your question made him smile. He flashed you his teeth and you winced. They looked like fangs and at the moment he was too close to your neck to keep calm.

"I wasn't really surprised," he said now. "This game ... we made it up ourselves. The first to seduce wins. Whoever makes our victim sin ... wins! But ... you ... you're a tough nut. Iwaizumi was strictly against giving you the details, but ... who cares, right? Not me."  
He took a deep breath and then exhaled against your neck.

“We usually need a week at most. Sometimes two. If things go really bad, three, but you broke the one-month mark. That‘s a record. But our hosts seem to rebel. You know, the longer we are in them, the more difficult it is to control them. Kuroo was the first to have a... malfunction, let‘s call it that. "  
He let go of you, pushed himself back into his own seat, where he rested his arm on the back of the sofa, put his head in his hand and watched your reaction.

"In very tough cases, you have to play a little ... unfair, don't you think? I think we have all reached a point where we take this game too seriously.” - He shrugged as if he didn't mind. As if he had waited half an eternity for such a moment. - "Iwaizumi doesn't like you very much, but I'm guessing that he just can't handle the fact that you have wrapped us around your finger without even realizing it. Tell me, how did he react when you touched him? "  
The sparkle in his eyes was so typical of Bokuto that you paused for a moment. If he didn't open his mouth, you could swear it was him.

"He ..." You thought back to the day when he pushed you against a wall and threatened you and you shivered, "he pulled his arm back so quickly. I don't remember what he looked like, but he obviously didn't like it. "  
Bokuto started laughing. He would have loved to see that with his own eyes.

"Very interesting. All of this. The emotions, the pure longing ... everyone plays along with such a passion. Amazing.“ He took another look at your neck. "Let's see who wins. Let's see what we'll lose. Are your hands very cold?"  
You opened your mouth at the question and wanted to start speaking, when he had already reached out to take your hands and put them in his without you having to ask.  
You immediately felt the cozy warmth that you had not felt in a long time. You relaxed.

"You probably don't know that we have rules among ourselves regarding this game and I'm not someone who likes to play unfairly, but ... you really don't make it easy for me. Iwaizumi really didn't want to leave me alone with you and I really tried to keep myself under control, but ... it's about time we get you too. These feelings ... they are dangerous. And if I have to win with dishonest means before my host manages to throw me out, then ... "  
You didn't wait until he finished talking. You stood up so fast that you you felt dizzy for a second.  
Your eyes were just looking at the door that was your goal. But you could only take a few steps before his hand went around your wrist and dragged you back. You ignored that the touch felt good, pushed any thought of it out of your head.  
You were whirled around and saw the strange shadow in his glowing eyes. Your free arm pushed against his chest, slapped against it, but you felt the muscles under his sweater. You were trying to pull your arm back, tried to free yourself, but it didn't help.  
He pulled you back to himself, still had to fight against your wild movements and before you knew it, you fell together on the couch.  
He immediately sat up, pulled you with him and wrapped his other arm around your waist, so that with this simple movement, he could stop you from slipping away.

"Stop, Bokuto!" You shouted. "Let me **GO**!"  
You would have started screaming if his hand wasn't immediately put on your mouth.  
It happened so quickly that the only thing you saw last were his eyes, which glowed like hot lava before he closed them and buried his head in the back of your neck.  
You felt the two pointed canines teasing your skin before he sank them into your flesh and bit so hard that you cried out.  
His hand choked all sounds out and your body went limp.  
You didn't know if he had bitten hard enough to draw blood, but the pain passed - quickly.  
Your eyes stung and your cheeks felt damp.

You were crying.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you enjoy my fanfic and have some spare time, please consider leaving me reviews they motivate me a lot and get me through writing lows and ): i just love to read them.  
> Thank you for the many kudos and for reading. <3


	11. me&them

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay so!  
> First of all, I hope you guys are all safe and healthy and your families are too! 
> 
> I also would like to mention that I was very happy about the new comments and the new kudos!  
> I appreciate any kind of comment. If you have anything nice to say, some feedback, ideas or suggestions I would love to read them!  
> I'm still looking for a beta reader so if anyone is interested please msg me on tumblr under; kuwuroo
> 
> So yea sadly this one isn't beta read so I apologise in advance!!
> 
> Other than that I want to kind of clarify something I've explained in a comment for my german readers before but its important so I figured I'll do it here too.  
> Our seven boys aren't the only group of sins; its basically a big scheme, more on that in later chapters. But just fyi they're definitely not the only ones. I've included names, that they usually use to call eachother - more about that in later chapters as well, but seeing that I will include those for the first time I will write them down at the end of the chapter notes.
> 
> It's also good to know that the university doesn't have several volleyball teams walking around. There are groups and "teams", who play for fun or play to be seen, but if the university had to choose an official team it would obviously stay with the same players which i won't mention because this is kind of an AU so I don't even wanna get into the whole choosing thing because i could never.  
> Anyhoo theyre volleyball players because they either play for fun or play in teams that the university coaches ig but not all of them are official players when going to competitions or whatever. It's confusing but i wouldn't have known how to make it work any other way!
> 
> Also!!!!!!  
> The next two chapters will be the "filler" chapters which i split into two because the chapter got a bit too long. It also isn't much filler anymore since i put quite important stuff and development of the storyarc in there too. So next chapters will be fun, with a lot of characters!!
> 
> this was very hard to translate so please bear with my mistakes, im sorry aaa

> **_xx i have seen death and despair but you were still the one thing that hurt me the most. is there happiness in another life? xx_ **

The door swung open.

Your personal attacker, whose hands were still wandering around your neck, looked up and you did the same.  
Bokuto, who, after his little bite he'd done to your neck, firmly planned to mark any free place he could find. He was so hungry for you, that you might think he was starving and dehydrated and you were the last piece of sweet honey he could find.

You felt overcome by shame, that showed itself by your reddened cheeks, when you recognized Satori who was now standing in the door frame. His arms were crossed over his chest and his eyes narrowed suspiciously.   
You raised your hands to your face, wanting to hide behind them, but you would miss the way he was staring at you and Bokuto.

Tendou's mouth was barely open, the corners of his mouth curled up slightly as he looked at you wordlessly.  
Then he raised his arms and shrugged resignedly.

"It won't work, you know," he told Bokuto.

"What do you mean?" Bokuto asked in a deep voice. His lips were pink when he finally let go of you to sit up properly and question Satori.

"The marking, the biting" The redhead took a few steps into the room and closed the door behind him to protect himself from prying eyes and ears. He dropped his arms limply, pushed one leg out to lean against the snack machine, balancing himself on only one leg now. "It won't affect her."  
Satori laughed. His tongue flashed between his teeth and you almost thought he would stick his tongue out to you.

"I know my tricks," it came from Bokuto, from whom you could still feel the heat gushing out, that was trying to burn your entire side.

"Yea, yea," said Satori, "that you do! But she" - he pointed his finger at you - "is different."  
Your legs tingled from sitting on the couch that was sinking in more and more - the longer you two sat there. Your palms were sweating profusely and your neck felt numb.  
You squinted at Bokuto.  
His still pink lips were curling up into a grin and his yellow eyes weren't glowing, but seemed all the more enchanted - or cursed.  
You looked at his broad shoulders, then the muscular arms he had laid over the back of the couch and last but not least the disheveled hair.

It seemed unreal. You had just been in such intimate pose with him. He had left marks on your skin and every touch of his fingers had created a burning sensation that you now longed for.

Was all of this even real? How had your life gotten so out of hand that you sat here with Bokuto - even sitting next to eachother was something you would have never imagined before -, while he whispered sweet nothings to you; things that no other girl had ever heard, all while your throat was throbbing, because of markings that adorned your neck. Because he had left them there. Because Bokuto had kissed, nibbled and bit your neck.  
How did it get this far?

Satori grimaced, you sighed and Bokuto got up.  
For some inexplicable reason, you imitated him, got up and touched your pulsating spot on your neck for the first time.  
You felt two small holes he left behind and tried to be as careful as possible. They were hurting.  
Satori followed your every move and his expression changed. For the first time you saw him put off the bored gaze, to show you the worried expression he actually hid under it.  
Your name hung loosely on his lips, too controlled to speak, but you noticed the change in him.

You had always found Bokuto to be quite charmful, even now when there was something slumbering in him that came close to an unsatisfied hunger, you couldn't bring yourself up to hate him. But he triggered an uneasiness in you, that you never felt with Satori.  
Out of those seven, the redhead may have been the only one, who stood out like your own little, safe island to take you away to, when the water around you threatened to drown you.  
The distance between you two ... almost hurt. Or maybe it was just your merciless fingers that panicked over your neck and pressed into every spot to find out the extent of Bokuto's attack.

"You shouldn't have touched her," Satori said, who was now taking a step towards you. "Not only will it have no effect on her and she will look at you with the same eyes, no, besides, the others will not react as calmly as I do."  
It seemed as if the being in Satori had lost Satori's personality completely and was talking through and through only through the blue glowing eyes that were slowly becoming present. They made their way through Satori's self-control, through every barrier that the being and Satori had put up and made themselves recognizable.  
You shivered slightly.

"And Kuroo?" The question came like a knife that cut through the tense mood and made Bokuto's grin crumble. "Where did you take him? You want to play unfairly, okay, fine, do that, but not in a delicate situation like this. Something is coming, don't you feel that?"  
You followed Satori's eyes, who was staring down at Bokuto. And then the white-haired male blinked, opened his eyes again and showed off the new orange eye colour, that was glowing threatingly. They were daring to trickle down his face like hot honey.  
It was the first time that you saw two of them presenting their eyes to eachother and goosebumps formed on your arms.  
The sheer power that emerged from both of them was like smoke that wrapped around your body and distorted the room.

" _You_ shouldn‘t be talking," Bokuto finally groaned back. "You chose her, afterall."  
Bokuto grabbed your arm, his grip iron hard as he dragged you towards him, then pushed you forward, causing you to stumble into the middle of the room.  
Your head jerked back to face him. The anger boiling inside you was noticeable on your face. You narrowed your eyes at him and breathed heavily. You were done with his behaviour.

"So what," you hissed back. "Never touch me again. None of you. Never shove me like that again. I'm not a little doll with whom you can do whatever you want. You're an assh- "  
You couldn't finish talking, you couldn't throw all your ugly thoughts at him.  
Bokuto looked at you through pain-distorted eyes. The left side of his face started twitching and your heart hurt, when you saw the glow fade from his eyes.

He dropped to his knees, the carpet under your feet muffled most of it, but it still looked painful. His whole body sagged together and you could only stare at him while you heard Satori whisper a "shit" before he crossed the room and came to Bokuto‘s rescue.

"Is it-" you started.

"The same as Kuroo, yes"  
Bokuto suddenly looked up, his eyes normal, but the movement so fast that even Satori was startled.  
Your name rolled over his lips. Gentle, quiet, almost fragile.

"I'm ... sorry," he said, lowering his head again. "I wasn't me ... I didn't mean to do this ... my head ..."

"Remarkable," Satori said before Bokuto's hands snapped forward to lean against the floor and falling forward, head first. And then his arms gave up, he collapsed, and his entire body followed, causing him to fall to the ground and stop moving.  
You stood with your eyes wide open and swallowed hard. His name was stuck in your throat. Did Bokuto actually break through and got to speak to you for a few seconds? Would that mean that he knew what the being in him was doing?

You could hardly breathe, but Satori crouched down and confirmed that you shouldn't worry. He was just passed out and he would get back on his feet, but advised you to leave before that happened.  
You had the urge to cry.  
Satori tried to lift the massive Bokuto so that he could at least lean him against something - if someone came in - which was difficult for him. You stood on the other side of Bokuto, grabbed his arm, which you put on your shoulders and together you were able to put him on the couch. Even in his current state, he was very warm.  
When Satori noticed your wet eyes, he sighed.

"You wouldn't be the balance in person if this would upset you so easily, would you?" He asked, an undefined undertone in it that made you pause.  
You wanted to answer and question him, but then he was grinning again and his eyes fell back into his usual bored expression.

"Go, I‘ll see you tomorrow."  
And you did. You turned around and left the room with a heavy stomach and a bad feeling.

**_▪︎ ♧ ▪︎_ **

  
You had taken your things, half of which you left with Hana and the other half in your last lecture hall.  
The wind blew your hair around your ears. It was cold and you were freezing. The sky was all shades of gray and the campus was as quiet as if everything and everyone had gone into hibernating state.  
You put your hands in your jacket pockets. You had closed the zipper all the way up, worried that someone would notice your neck.  
It was a strange feeling to just walk out and make your way home, as if you were leaving your heart in college and straying farther and farther away from it, but this same heart showed itself as it lay like a stone in your chest. As if you had briefly doubted its place, so it had to assure you that it was there and still contracted painfully.  
Satori was right. You let yourself be carried away. This wasn't you.

_This wasn't you._

_Bu this also wasn‘t them._

You arrived at the gate of the university. The high fence around it looked huge up close and you shuddered when you stepped outside the campus grounds.  
Every day when you left the campus and left the school area behind you, it was a strange feeling, but especially today, your heart, your hands and your body didn't seem to be making friends with the idea of going home.

The trees that towered above you next to the pedestrian path seemed much bigger than usual. The world seemed to want to swallow you and you felt smaller and smaller the further you walked.

The smell of food penetrated your nose, which you tried to hide behind your scarf, so you threw your head back a little to clear your face from the thick fabric.  
The Takoyaki stall next to your university wasn‘t infrequently here, but especially today, it seemed to grab your attention.

You noticed the old lady who owned the booth and watched her try to carry a box behind her stall.  
Without thinking about it, your legs brought you to her.

Many called her Granny because she always smiled when one of the many students bought food from her, but you don't remember a time when you had ever called her that. And yet it naturally came out of you.

"Granny!" You cried out and were startled by your own voice calling out for her. "Let me help you."  
You stopped right in front of her and already stretched out your arms to take over from there.  
Her eyes, which had grown smaller after all the years and the many smiles, looked at you with a surprising look in them. Then she smiled sweetly, which reached her eyes.

"Thank you, my child," she said, handing you the box.  
Her slightly hunched over shape seemed permanent, as she went around the stand like that, even without the box.  
She pointed her finger to back of the booth where you found several boxes and asked you to put it there.  
You didn't know exactly how such a fragile-looking woman could lift this box, but you had trouble moving it from point A to point B, even though it was only a few meters.

After you put the box down where she had wanted it, she scurried you back in front of the stall and went inside.

"You saved me from a lot of back pain tonight, my child. Come on, I only have one serving left. I'll quickly make you some Takoyaki."  
You almost wanted to say no, but when you saw her smile that hadn't even left her face, you couldn't.  
You nodded and stretched out your hand with the right amount of money to hand it over to her.  
She looked puzzled.

"No, don't be silly," she said, but you insisted. You saw her here almost every day, regardless of the weather. You wouldn't miss the money, but every cent helped her.  
Since you didn't even think of taking your hand down, she accepted the money after a few seconds and bowed gratefully.

You watched her adjust the plate and take a few bowls to prepare the takoyaki mix.  
Usually this went by faster, but since she was probably done with todays work, she had already packed everything up and you felt almost bad ... until she started humming cheerily.  
She didn't seem to mind, she hummed and smiled to herself.  
Every now and then she stole a look into your direction.  
Whch prompted you to pull the scarf around your neck tighter, fearing she would notice the indecent markings on your neck.  
You didn't even want to think about it, nor what kind of impression you would have made. You hadn't looked at yourself after you had left.

Perhaps she noticed the fear that was anchored in your bones, the immoral fingerprints on your body, the nervousness that shaped you and your heavy heart that made you feel as if you were on withdrawal.  
You rubbed your hands together, visibly lost in thought.

"Are you all right, my child? Would you like a warm tea?” She suddenly asked, as she looked at you with concern on her face.

"I‘m fine, thank you," you replied quickly.

"You look like you‘ve got your heart broken," she remarked and you looked at her perplexed. She just started to smile when she noticed your expression. "Young love isn‘t easy."  
You wanted to shake your head, tell her that; no matter what any of this was, it wasn't love. But you couldn‘t.

"Love makes us act strange, my child," she said, "you look very dazed like you aren‘t yourself."  
You watched her skillful hands fill the mold and pull out the squid pieces.

"I think ... sometimes we are chosen for things that aren‘t easy. Our hearts are cunning, it is not easy to have it in us. A heart makes us act foolishly. But you cannot change your fate, my child. However, you can get strong enough to take it on. Don‘t you think?"  
You looked at her closely. Your eyes were too stern, too serious ... too present with a worry that was reflected on your face, but you looked at her, took her words in and even though your eyes didnt show any kindness, you were able to force out a smile.

You hadn't noticed how fast she was until you looked away from her face to look down.  
She was already putting the round pieces of Takoyaki on a small paper plate.  
Before you knew it, she handed you the food. You stretched your arm out to take it and accidentally brushed her hand.

You blinked only briefly, almost missing how her hand trembled just before you could take the plate. The food fell from her shaky hand and you were too slow to react.  
She got startled, gasped and you remained in your position for a few seconds.

"I'm sorry," she said immediately, looking at you with a distressed expression, "I should have been more careful."

"No, no," you reassured her, "it was my fault, I‘m sorry."

"C-Come by tomorrow, please?", She finally pulled her hand back and looked at you with a shocked expression, "I'll make you a new portion."

"No problem," you didn't want to embarrass her any more than she already seemed to be, "I'll come by tomorrow. Have a nice evening."  
You waved to her, then you made your way home.

**_▪︎ ♧ ▪︎_ **

  
The next day was already a pain.  
You were nowhere to be found, which made the boys restless and tense, until they finally saw you, way too late for their taste.  
Still, it was a strange day with a mood that put the whole group on edge.  
Satori was right.  
The first thing Iwaizumi tended to when he got there, was Bokuto' _situation_.

Right in the morning, anger had seized him when he saw Bokuto's smile. It was strange to watch.  
They often quarreled, but not like that.

Iwaizumi was known to clash with the other boys, but not to such an extent.  
In the middle of the campus, in front of many other students, he had grabbed Bokuto by the collar and dragged him after him.  
Kuroo immediately tried to intervene to free Bokuto from Iwaizumi's clasp, but he knew well enough that it wouldn‘t be easy.

Terushima had been luckier. When he had found you and took you by surprise, making you vulnerable to his touch, the anger within Iwaizumi had still slumbered in him - had not yet dared to emerge, had not yet been tickled out.

Wrath was always one of the last to show up in his host.

He had influenced his host a little without wanting it, but the decision to knock Terushima down came a hundred percent from Iwaizumi alone, who had heard the blonde male take advantage of your moment of weakness.

But this time ... he had warned them. Especially Terushima and Bokuto, who were the ones most likely to use _destruction_ and _fixation_.  
Maybe a part in Iwaizumi would have sounded an alarm of some kind to make him stop, or maybe it was just the many students who gasped at the sight and didn't know what to do in shock, but the thing was... he couldn't stop.  
The tremendous strength that came out of him was already well known - Iwaizumi had always been strong - but the sin in him seemed to help him with that. He was able to swing Bokuto around like a lifeless doll.  
It was almost too easy to push Kuroo out of the way, while he only saw _red_. 

Bokuto's hands also found Iwaizumi's collar, which he clung into.

It looked bad. All of this did.

Bokuto's back collided with the front door, which Iwaizumi pushed him against - with such force that one might think he was out to break Bokuto‘s entire back.  
He pulled him forward just to knock him against the wall again. A painful groan left Bokuto's mouth as he gritted his teeth and tugged on Iwaizumi's collar to turn this around.  
All one had to do was blink to miss how they changed positions.

Bokuto had to use both hands to get him somewhat under control. He was taller and broader than the black-haired male, but that didn't seem to give him any advantages at the moment.  
Kuroo opened the front door, causing the two to stumble through the door frame, while still clinging to eachother desperate to win the upper hand. It was a strange sight; hunger yearned for control and wrath yearned for destruction.

The power between them was like gunpowder, which seemed to distort the looks of those nearby.  
The hallway where they were now in, seemed to bend under the tremendous heat and power that these two exuded. It was surreal, inhuman and indefinable.  
As if steam was rising from their bodies.

Iwaizumi was only working with one hand and Bokuto didn't want to give him a chance to use the second one as well. He knew that would make him unbeatable. He had to act quickly.

Footsteps followed. Within this chaos, the many gawks and the five other sins standing around talking to each other, one could hardly tell what was going to happen next.  
Bokuto, however, managed to push the feral Iwaizumi up against a wall. His approach was completely different.  
His fingers bored into Iwaizumi's collar. The fabric felt rough as he tugged on it and wore it out.

"Damn," Bokuto breathed heavily, "calm down!"  
The heads of Kuroo, Oikawa and Lev appeared next to them.  
But nobody's hands let go of the other person. It was a fight that led in an ignorant direction, but the attention they were drawing was already too big to control.

Kuroo's powerful arms struggled between Bokuto and Iwaizumi, Lev pulled on Bokuto's arms, while Oikawa concentrated on Iwaizumi, whose expression turned into something wild.

Terushima didn't even come closer. If he came into Iwaizumi's field of vision, he would be the next victim and he would rather avoid that.

Satori, however, watched all of this, with some sick kind of joy on his face.  
Something in him switched over as if the last piece of the puzzle was close to fitting.  
He was pretty indifferent about the whole situation. His thoughts were all about you and all the possibilities that were gradually opening up.  
A smile formed on his face, one he couldn‘t hide anymore.

"You make everyone aware of us, everyone!" It came from Oikawa, who was taller than Iwaizumi, but whose strength was not nearly the same.  
Together with Kuroo and Lev, they were able to pull the two brawlers apart.  
But this did not calm them down, nor put a stop to their fight.  
Bokuto tried to scurry forward and only met Kuroo, who stopped him.

"We have rules!" Shouted Iwaizumi, who tried to push past Oikawa and Lev. "You can't just do what you want."

"Why do you care? You hate her and you hate this whole game!“ Countered Bokuto, whose tone became more and more aggressive.  
Iwaizumi was close to exploding and was risking to lose himself in a fury, that was unhealthily bubbling up inside of him.  
The words seemed him to be missing.

Bokuto was right, why did he care so much? What could he reply to not make it appear like he cared about you, because he didn't.   
He detested what you triggered in him. He really did. Yet...

"That's exactly why I can say all of that!", He tried to shake himself free - to no avail, "you can't just do what you want."  
He couldn't explain himself, couldn't express himself well enough, couldn't put it into words, which is why he had arranged for Bokuto and Terushima to avoid you.  
The group of students around them grew.  
Nobody dared to interfere.

They trusted Kuroo and Oikawa to let them handle this. They usually played their charm and seemed to solve everything, but had to assert themselves differently this time.  
With a final push and a shake of Bokuto, he was able to fight his way free of Kuroo's grip, but stayed where he was.

He was suddenly very calm, still angry, but ... he just raised his hand and pointed at Satori, who expected it all come back to find him.

"Don‘t blame me. _He_ chose her." - He remembered the previous day -" He knew that nothing would work on her. That's why he chose her. He confirmed it to me yesterday."

Iwaizumi's face contorted with rage and he tensed up. His eyes fell on Satori, who was standing there and ... laughing.  
An almost melodic laugh came out of him, which started very quietly and then was so loud and clear that it made Iwaizumi's head spin.

The heads all turned. Each pair of eyes fixated the redhead with the protruding hair, who laughed despite the circumstances, the tense mood and the audience. He shrugged as everyone looked at him.  
His complete lack of interest in the situation and the consequences that came with it, caused Iwaizumi to boil with anger again.  
Even Bokuto looked at him annoyed.

Kuroo and Oikawa took this short moment to dedicate themselves to the group of students around them.  
The black-haired man raised his hands soothingly and Oikawa smiled charmingly.

"That was ... a little too much for an otherwise calm morning, huh?" Oikawa said. "At least everyone is awake now."

"We're really sorry ... something like that can happen to even the bestest friends, I guess" added Kuroo and laughed, his self-confidence unshaken. "But the show is over now."

On cue, Lev started pulling the petrified Iwaizumi along, whose eyes were fixed on Satori.  
They couldn't say for sure if you had heard all of this. They haven't had the chance to look around for you.

But the game was getting serious; too serious.  
The boys couldn‘t remember a moment when they had ever gotten so close to ripping eachother‘s throats out. There have been many disputes, but never this extreme.

Iwaizumi let himself be dragged along, his legs went without him really noticing where he was going. He stared holes into Satori's back and couldn't even focus on Terushima, who was right next to him.

After getting rid of most of the students, Oikawa and Kuroo joined the others.  
There was a staircase, then another until they were on the second floor where many of the classrooms were.  
Since it was so early, the students they ran into became fewer and fewer.

Maybe it was the quiet darkness that lurked in some corners - the sun wasn't strong enough this time of the year to cover everything - or maybe it was the slight intuition that Iwaizumi truly never forgot or forgave, but when he suddenly sprinted forward to catch Satori when he least expected it, the redhead dodged out of the way.

Iwaizumi was fast, but Satori was faster. He just scurried to the side, taking only a few steps to avoid feeling his teammate's anger. It was an invincible struggle, sooner or later _Wrath_ would catch _Sloth_.

When Iwaizumi's hand reached for something firm and finally managed to dig into Satori's jacket, the redhead didn't fight it.  
A grin was still on his face.

The morning was merciless. Cold and dark.

Iwaizumi dragged him behind, opened the next best door, and slid inside. The boys followed; Kuroo already trying to talk some sense into him.  
The door closed behind the seventh member.  
It was another class room. Smaller than the lecture halls.  
Somewhat old-fashioned, like the classrooms in high schools.  
The light didn't fall in here. For some reason the blinds were pulled down.  
It was a strange play of light as the sun tried to sneak some rays into the room. One couldn't say for sure whether the gloom of the tense mood seemed to change the room.  
They had already brought enough attention to themselves today. This wouldn‘t be easy to cover up, people would talk about this - even days later. So they didn't need more pairs of eyes that watched their every move.

Again Iwaizumi's anger took over, manifested itself in every fiber of his body and he started trembling and shaking.  
His shoulders were tense, his jaw was tight, and his eyebrows were drawn together as he stared down at Satori, eyes glowing red. With a smooth movement, he pulled him towards him, causing Satori to almost collapse and sag down into himself. He let his entire body still and relaxed. Every movement of Iwaizumi was filled with an impenetrable anger and power that Satori simply wouldn't be equal against, so he did what suited him the most.  
He let it happen and hardly cared about it.

His knees hit the cold floor and soon the only thing that held him up was Iwaizumi's hands, which held him by the collar.  
Even his head was hanging slightly down, while the small smile on his lips was still there and only seemed to provoke the black-haired male in front of him more.

"You can smile while you‘re ruining us?" Iwaizumi asked incredulously. It was almost ridiculous. Since when was he out to destroy this group? “We are too good to be erased so easily. A case that we can‘t finish isn‘t that bad. But this situation right now is all your fault. Because of you something broke that is beyond our control and ... you knew that? You expected it to happen, didn't you? What the hell is causing you to betray us like this?!"  
His fingers clung to the soft fabric of Satori's sweater, who just looked to the side and continued to smile without saying a word.

"How could he have known that this would happen?" Lev asked and came closer with his arms crossed in front of his chest.  
Kuroo next to him had a hand on his forehead, as if all of that was too much for even him.

"He's always choosing them," commented Terushima, "I guess he noticed the change. When we got here it was immediately different. You can't tell me you didn't feel that too. "

"You feel way too many things anyway," Bokuto snapped and looked back at Satori.  
The redhead had never been a big fan of this game.  
It was a nice balance when they played, seduced and made people fall into their deadly trap. Satori mostly did nothing, sometimes it even helped him to win, because the chosen people would do the same. The longer one was next to them, the bigger the chance that the sins rubbed off onto them. So why did you seem so immune to everything?

They had all left their essence on you, be it like Terushima, who immediately thought of seducing you, or Kuroo, who had put himself into your group project and thus spent more time with you than anyone else.  
Even Iwaizumi, who came out reluctantly, had literally left his fingerprints on you.

But you just didn't want to let anyone in.  
You just wanted to stay balanced and carefree. As if none of the sins could harm you.

"Why did you choose her?" Asked Oikawa, whose eyes were now bright green. "All of this is unnatural. Iwaizumi is right. We shouldn't feel anything. See how Iwaizumi acts. Don't come for me, but no matter how often you mention that you don't like her, she‘s the reason you want to bash our heads in more often than usual."  
The addressee gritted his teeth at Oikawa.

"Ugh," he said, and was about to hit the brown-haired male, "just shut up!"  
Oikawa grimaced and seemed to have his point confirmed.

"Did you ask any of us? If we would approve of this whole thing? You put our entire existence - our lives - in danger."  
Now it was Kuroo's turn to talk to Satori, but it was in vain. They knew him well enough. He would show no regrets.

"Do you call - what we have at the moment - a life?" Satori's sudden speech silenced the others. His voice sounded forced and debilitated.  
He looked up at Iwaizumi and flashed his blue eyes.  
There was instant tension around the two, which made everyone even more restless.

"Boys ... boys, I did you a favor" and as soon as Satori uttered those words, the others tried to stop Iwaizumi, who was so quick that nobody could have stopped him.  
He punched him in the face so hard, that Satori's head flew to the side causing someone in the room to gasp.

_**▪︎ ♧ ▪︎** _

You hadn't noticed much.  
Some students asked you to check on them after they told you what had just happened. You hardly believed your ears.

It wasn‘t difficult to find them.  
They were easy to find because everyone noticed them and could therefore tell you in which direction they went.

It was the first time you bothered to look for them.  
For the past month, you had done nothing but avoid them as much as possible, find secret passages or shortcuts, and hide.  
You usually didn't ask around for them. You knew people were talking about you, but you wanted to continue living as you always did.

It may have been all the more strange that you went from student to student to ask if anyone had seen them.  
It was a feeling of belonging that was heavy in your chest.

You belonged to their small group, whether you liked it or not. Students put you together when they talked about you.  
You didn't want to admit it, but if you wanted to live any longer in ignorance of not feeling connected to them, you would have to call yourself stupid.

You hurried up the stairs and almost threw yourself at the next student who walked past you. You wanted to ask if he had seen them. The boys ... _your_ boys. The ones you were connected to for some inexplicable reason, but when your heart contracted painfully, you didn't have to.

You felt it. You felt them nearby.  
As strange as that sounded ... the heavy energy in the air, the heat that dripped from one of the rooms and your cold hands seemed to be sign enough.

The hallway in front of you hid many doors.  
It shouldn't have been so easy for you to find the right door, but when you put your hand on the doorknob, you already knew that you were right.  
You slipped in so inconspicuously and quietly that you were proud of yourself that you had made no noise.  
Your eyes had to get used to the darkness that was present here and for a millisecond you feared that you were wrong.

Then you noticed the bright colors; red and blue.

You blinked a few times, pressed yourself against the wall and were sure that every other day they would have felt that you were there - with them.  
After a few more seconds you finally recognized the silhouettes of the boys standing in the middle of the room, all staring at Satori and Iwaizumi. The completely blind rage that hid behind Iwaizumi's face made a shiver run down your spine.

"Boys ... boys, I did you a favor," Satori had said.  
The black-haired man had raised his fist and hit him in the face with such force that you gasped for air and immediately put a hand over your mouth.

Satori's head shook once and he slowly turned it towards you; the blue glowing eyes on you now. You recognized blood dripping from his lower lip.  
Iwaizumi's glowing red eyes immediately found yours and you felt a fear creep inside of you instantly.

The rest of the figures in the room turned to you too, completely baffled and confused about your arrival. Just when Iwaizumi had already let go of Satori, who fell on his butt and came stomping towards you.  
They all followed after him, already guessing what that would mean. 

You kept pushing yourself against the wall and were reminded of your first encounter with the being in Iwaizumi.  
It was the same situation, but this time he came even faster, his face more contorted with rage.

He snapped towards you. His hands clawed into your jacket now, where they didn't stay. He just pulled you forward just to push you against the wall by the door.  
The air was literally blown out of your body when you collided with the wall and before he could act again you saw Kuroo's hand, which was pressing against his chest to stop him.

"That‘s enough," he said.

"Stop it," Lev called, using his size as an advantage and standing in front of you. It was like an impenetrable wall, as high as a tower and so broad that even you could see nothing but Lev's back and the outstretched arms that were protecting you.

"It's all her fault!" Iwaizumi screamed and your mouth was hanging wide open in shock.  
You didn't dare to breathe until Oikawa came to your side. He eyed Lev critically and then looked at you. His eyes were perfectly normal and brown, his facial expression apologetic.

"Everything okay?" He asked, looking at you from top to bottom. He tried to find out if you had any injury, but you couldn't answer. So you nodded.

You heard them pushing and shoving eachother around, you no longer knew who was on your side or on Iwaizumis. Did they really argue or was that part of the game? You were confused.

"There are no rules anymore," whispered Satori, who gradually found his strength and got up to stand.

"New situations require new rules," replied Iwaizumi, who was not so happy with the freedom.

"No," you heard Satori again, "you will quickly notice that rules will no longer work here. I suggest you adapt before we continue playing **without** you."

"You damn-" Iwaizumi couldn't finish his sentence.

"Hey, hey!", Bokuto came briefly into your field of vision, then disappeared in front of Lev's broad form.

You sighed.  
It was time to play along.  
It was time to no longer question your presence and your belonging, but actually to cooporate with them.  
You had to act. You couldn't let them do whatever they wanted to, anymore. It was enough for you.

Your hand found Lev's forearm.  
He immediately turned his head to you and looked at you with wide eyes.  
The touch burned comfortably and you knew he felt the same way.  
Oikawa snorted a little contemptuously, the envy inside him came to the surface and he examined your hand on Lev's arm.  
But you gave them a quick glance to make them understand that they should let you do whatever it was you intended to do.  
So you took a step to the side, stood next to Lev and had a perfect view of the other five boys again.

"Rules," you said casually. Your tone cool, your thoughts clear. "Rules here, rules there. This is really annoying."  
You crossed your arms over your chest.

"I suggest we start talking soon because I really don't feel like playing cat and mouse games anymore. For a month you have been doing nothing but stalking me and I have gradually understood that these feelings are not one-sided. You think that's unnatural? Well, me too, but I want answers or I will disappear. I don't care how long it will take until you have no more control over the boys, but you will never see me again and no matter what you "- you pointed your finger at Iwaizumi -"try to make me believe, I know exactly that even you can feel with your heart made of ice. "

"Oh," Kuroo said, almost laughing, "this kitten is good."

"Fiery," said Bokuto, and a hunger flashed in his eyes that made him lick his lips, "let's just be careful not to burn ourselves."

"You wouldn't understand it," it came from Iwaizumi, who finally seemed to be cooling off.

"I want to judge for myself - whether I understand it or not."

"We can no longer leave her in the dark. She has already proven that she deserves the details. Satori is right. This is no longer our typical game. To be honest, I'm fed up with it, anyway. I like the change, the feelings and ... the passion.”  
Oikawa's undertone was characterized by an ambiguity that didn't fly past you, but he ended his sentence with cheekily sticking out his tongue, which convinced you that the boys were still in there, somewhere. It was so typical of Oikawa that a smile formed on your lips.  
He noticed that and winked at you.

A smile also formed on Iwaizumi's face. It was very different from yours and you weren't sure if you had ever seen him smile in the past month, but it gave you goosebumps.  
He took a step towards you and everyone in the room moved.  
Lev's hand gripped your wrist and you winced.  
Oikawa did the same; his hand found your other wrist and stayed there.  
Terushima had taken a step in your direction and Satori had also came closer.  
Kuroo had barely stood between you and Iwaizumi, and Bokuto crouched as to being able to attack and pounce on someone more easily that way.

It was strange, all of you started to work like a clockwork, like a cogwheel that moved when the other one did.  
Everyone seemed to be looking at Iwaizumi and waiting.  
He took a few more steps under the peering eyes of his playmates until he stopped close in front of you.  
You banished any emotion from your face. You no longer wanted to be read so easily, especially not by him.

"You're not scared?" He asked teasingly. "Are you a big girl now?"  
He pushed his head forward to startle you, but you didn't flinch.

"You think because you have an effect on us that I can't hurt you?"

"I even suspect that you will, no matter how you feel. I am not surprised.“ You replied confidently.  
That made him raise an eyebrow.

"You act different, what happened? Do you draw strength from the fact that several boys want you? Are you so easy to read? So easy to see through?"  
His eyes fell onto your neck, which you were still trying to hide with a thick scarf and turtleneck.  
You didn't answer. His words left a bitter aftertaste on his tongue that even you felt.

You shook your hands free from Lev and Oikawa and without a further warning, you raised your right hand and put it on Iwaizumis cheek.  
He took a step back, but you followed.

Your hand got very warm.  
His cheek was soft and immediately more warmth shot into his face, which turned his cheeks pink.  
The red eyes stung and his hand came out to cover your wrist.  
His grip was firm, almost ironclad, and it hurt, but you didn't let go.

The red in his eyes faded and you saw it literally disappear.  
His eyes closed for a second and when he opened them again you saw the hatred in them that was still aimed at you, but there was something else behind it.

From his left eye came a single, lonely tear that struggled to cross over his thick lashes to roll down his cheek.  
Then he slapped your hand away and it fell limply to your side.  
You weren't sure if you were the only one who saw this, but you never would have expected it.  
He turned on his heel and went to the windows, as far away from you as possible.

"If she doesn't leave in three seconds, no one will be able to stop me when I get to her."  
Nobody seemed to take the threat lightly.  
Lev and Oikawa were the first to move and push you towards the door.

"You'll get all your answers soon," Kuroo assured you.  
You slipped through the narrow crack in the door and the door closed behind you.

_**▪︎ ♧ ▪︎** _

It was hard to go down the stairs without getting lost in your thoughts.  
It felt like a small breakthrough and at the same time, as if you had taken several steps backwards.  
Every time you thought about it, the bloodstained face of Satori, Lev's protective form, and Iwaizumi's tear were the things that bothered you the most.

He had cried and you had triggered it.  
The one you thought was nothing but an empty shell filled with anger had shown you such a vulnerable side - albeit reluctantly.

When you arrived on the ground floor, you found that several pairs of eyes were already chasing after you. Word had gotten around about Iwaizumi and Bokuto's fight that even the last sleepy student had got wind of it.  
It was uncomfortable to be in the building where girls judged and whispered about you, all while boys started laughing when they saw you.

You sent a message to Hana - you needed her company now. She was still on her way, but you couldn't imagine waiting for her here. It was a constricting feeling and the eyes of your classmates were pushy and penetrative.  
You pulled on the ends of your scarf, the tighter around your neck, the better. You preferred to wait for Hana outside, but even on campus it was too much.  
As soon as you opened the front door and stepped out, a small group of girls had pointed at you and started whispering.

"Because of her, they‘re punching their heads in?" One of them had asked incredulously.

"I heard she was messing around with Kuroo and then she was caught with Bokuto in the lounge - the same day!“ it came from a different girl.

"The poor guys, they don't deserve that," added another of them and you clenched your hands into fists.  
You wish you could exchange places with them. You would have liked to have given them your strange connection with the boys. You wanted to shout at them that YOU were the victim. You weren't a bitch that jumped from man to man and destroyed years of friendship by having relationships with several of them. Even the thought alone made you angry.

It vibrated briefly in your jacket pocket and you fished out your cell phone.  
Hana had written to you that you two could meet in front of the gate and you were grateful for that.  
You ran across campus, the faster you got out of here, the better. Walking around here with Hana wouldn't be half as bad.

The high treetops greeted you again as you left the campus grounds and stepped in front of the gate.  
You leaned against the rock from which the gate was made. It felt terribly cold on your back and your thoughts wandered. Iwaizumi's shadow was still haunting your thoughts.

You looked around and were happy when you recognized the small Takoyaki booth from yesterday.  
It was getting lighter and even though it was still early, you assumed that grandmother was getting ready for the day.  
You didn't see much, but you could still see the little, hunched over shape of her. Her back was a bit crooked because of her age - the hump was particularly noticeable when she leaned forward.  
With new energy you ran up to the stall and called for her.

"Gran-", you said, but stopped when you saw the person behind it now getting up.  
It wasn't the nice old lady from yesterday. Instead, a young woman looked at you in surprise.  
Her long black hair hung straight over her back and the straight bangs put her pretty face in a flattering frame.  
The red-painted lips now smiled the closer you got.  
There was something fancy and elegant about her that you couldn't place exactly.  
Her height almost jutted over the openage that was there to serve customers.  
She was wearing the same apron Granny did, that didn't really match her outfit.  
The red coat underneath flattered her shape and you watched her straighten her hair and then wink at you. The red fingernails matched the same shade of red on her.

"Unfortunately I have to disappoint you," she said in a melodious voice and cocked her head to the side. “Granny is at home and is resting. I'm taking over her stand today."

"Oh, I'm sorry," you replied quickly, completely flashed by her beauty, which simply didn't end. You couldn't see enough of her.

"Well, well," she said, waving you off, "it's not an issue. I'm not overly excited to be here, but it's fine. You know, grandmother always says that when I am here, everything sells better. "  
She looked at you thoughtfully for a moment, as if thinking back to the moment when she was told that.  
You were still confused. You could have sworn that the hunched over shape belonged to Granny.

"Don‘t tell me, you're the nice girl from yesterday?" it came suddenly from her and you looked at her in surprise. "Did you help my grandmother yesterday? She talked about you all evening. That was very nice of you."

"It really wasn't remarkable. I- “, she interrupted you quickly.

"Do not be absurd! Wait, I'll make you a portion of the best takoyaki. I promise you, she taught me well."  
You couldn't be angry with her. Her charm made her incredibly personable and you couldn't say no either.  
As she started preparing the mixture, you watched her skilled hands. While doing so, she waved at passing students every other minute. They either waved back or stood there, completely flashed by her beauty as well.

"She was very impressed of you - grandmother I mean.", She started and still looked down concentratedly as to not make a mistake. "People can be quite superficial, don't you think? The same students who are paying attention to me today would not look at this stall every other day.”

Another group of boys came by, gawking at the woman in front of you and she smiled sweetly, looking up and waving at them with a wink.  
She was right.  
You had never noticed how busy it was every other day you passed by, but when you looked behind you now, several students stood in line as if they appeared out of nowhere.  
You had wanted to answer, at least nod or say "hmm", but a strange feeling in your chest made you look to the right.

Your eyes were glued to the gate, where several students went through to get to the campus.  
As if on cue, someone ran out. So fast that some had turned around in amazement and he had whirled up several leaves.

Lev was standing in front of the gate, his chest rose and fell quickly and he breathed in and out atypically.  
It wasn't long before Oikawa followed.  
They looked at you for a long time until they got their breathing under control and then walked towards you.  
Every step towards you made your heart flutter and you swallowed hard. It was difficult to take their eyes off them.  
When they finally got to you, they seemed to want to get rid of unsaid words; Things that they wanted to say, that they wanted to let you know, but when Oikawa looked past you for a second and looked at the booth, it all seemed forgotten.

"Afuru," he whispered, causing Lev to look up as well.  
You looked back at the young woman in front of you who smiled even wider at the name.

"Hello, boys," Afuru said, putting the mixture aside.  
She wiped her hands on her apron and skillfully removed the piece of cloth.

"Sorry guys, I'm taking a break now!" She called into the queue and you were surprised at the positive answers she got back. Nobody seemed angry with her.  
She folded up the old apron, put it on the small counter and went around to go straight towards you.  
Lev immediately pulled you into him and you bumped into his chest. He moved like your shadow and stood protectively in front of you again. Oikawa used this moment to put his arm around your shoulders and stick out his tongue.

"Meh, stupid Lev," he said, although the situation seemed serious.

"I see you adapt well," said Afuru when she finally stood in front of you. You could now admire her in full size.  
She had long, thin legs and red pumps that were exactly the same red as everything else on her.  
She seemed to be wearing a red dress underneath that came to an end just above her knees and you weren't the only one staring at her with your mouth open.  
The group of people had spread out, but they still looked back and admired the young woman.  
Oikawa's gaze turned sour and he shrugged his arm.

"What brings you here?" He asked, and Lev looked at her suspiciously.

"I was in the area," she replied, smiling slightly. Her dark eyes sparkled and she flashed a smile that showed her pearl white teeth. "But ... do tell. You don't normally need this long. What seems to be holding you seven back. Is this _her_?"  
She came even closer, wanting to look at the newest victim of those seven, who were so good at their job, that she rarely bothered to check on them. But a low growl escaped Lev.

"Calm down, _Purpureus_ ," she said to him, running a hand over his shoulder and walking around him.

"I met her yesterday. We aren‘t strangers.” There was something mysterious in her undertone and you were playing around with the thought that you might not have imagined Granny earlier.

"You are the old lady," you said.

"Smart girl," she looked at you intently, "but you boys are supposed to be doing a job. You were brought here for a reason. You know the lyre, so why are you wasting precious time?"  
Her tone was reproachful, but you couldn't help thinking that she didn't mean it as badly as Oikawa and Lev assumed at the moment. They knew her better than you did, of course, and maybe you were totally wrong, but ...

" _We_ -" Oikawa started to explain, but was promptly interrupted.

"That‘s odd," Afuru commented directly, "you know, I don't think I've ever heard you include the others when you speak, _Virdis_."  
He rolled his eyes and your head felt dizzy at the new names.  
She put a finger to her lips and said "shhh", winked and went back to her stand.

"Anyway," she said, "I've got work to do. I have to run a Takoyaki stall. See you."  
And with these words she shooed you away and put the apron back on.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ater - Kuroo  
> Ruber - Iwaizumi  
> Virdis - Oikawa  
> Luteus - Terushima  
> Aurantius - Bokuto  
> Caeruleus - Satori  
> Purpureus - Lev
> 
> if you're good in latin you might already know what's up, but these would be the names they would call eachother - if i dont throw a tantrum and change them randomly.
> 
> By the way: Afuru's name is kind of foreshadowing!  
> Also fun fact; i read that if a single tear falls out of your left eye, it means pain. hehehe just saying. 
> 
> Poor Reader still hasn't had her takoyaki!
> 
> Thank you for reading and if you liked the chapter I would love to read your opinion about it! If you have any ideas, suggestions or feedback of some sort, please comment away.


	12. hatsukoi pt. 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the first part of my filler chapter because I missed our other haikyuu boys and i wish i could have added more but the second part to this chapter is already too long and there are too many boys and... thats why its split into two parts!
> 
> THANK YOU for the many comments they got me through my lows and the second part chapter is almost done and will probably be more than 10k words so thats fun, ig!  
> I loved all your comments and I would love to reply but i feel like im just increasing the comments with my nonsense if i do dsjdksjfhg 
> 
> Honestly thank you all so very much for the comments and the kudos and the few drawings I've seen! I love them a lot! peep my profile pic
> 
> I think we are slowly reaching the part of the story that will take on a real twist and I can't wait to write the angst. LMAO
> 
> The chapter name is a reference to a song made by Koji Tamaki if anyone wants to check it out. Its quite nostalgic sounding.
> 
> Also this is mostly just the intro to the chapter, i just had to split them into two because it got way too long and I felt it was necessary! Anyhooooooo... enjoy please.

> **_xx it was cold, when I was without you. come find me. for another tragic lovestory? xx_ **

Merely two days passed until you reached the end of your strength.

Wherever you went, people talked about you.

Hana was with you almost every time because she felt you weren't well enough to be left alone. She was clearly your only source of hope and you were incredibly grateful for her, but even _you_ knew it couldn't go on like this.  
At the end of the third day, Hana found you after your last lecture and linked her arm with yours.

"Did you eat?" She asked and you nodded.

"What about you?" You question seemed to catch her off guard. She looked at you with guilty eyes and then laughed. A small, self-pitying look and a pout appeared on her face.  
You shook your head at the sight, but broke into a smile.

"You're lucky I didn't touch my lunchbox. There were noodles in the cafeteria today, so I had to get them," you said and started digging around in your bag. You were happy to share your food. You had lost your appetite, anyway. 

"You know," she started, pressing closer to you, "I have the perfect suggestion."

"Perfect... suggestion?" You asked, looking at her in confusion.

"We urgently need a break, don't you think?"  
You looked at her suspiciously. She seemed to be concocting something.

"The students of landscape architecture and their professor started a small project," she informed you and continued to drag you along. “They offer a two-day trip in which we drive to a small suburb. Wouldn't that be exciting? You, me and nature!"

"Hana ...", you said in a muffled voice, "... what's the catch?"  
She threw her head back and laughed out loud. Then she hugged your arm and picked up in speed.

"Well ... they just want us to learn something about plants and such. For various projects, they need different plants to use. This is only offered to volunteers, but I think it sounds very sweet."

"You mean, we're actually only going to study up on some random plants and dig them up for two days?" You asked, actually thinking about the idea.

"Yes ... but listen. Before it gets cold and winter begins, the perfect time is now to collect everything that would soon die or that would not survive the snow. It's not very fancy... and we will get our hands dirty, but I would find it exciting and you don't have to listen to any stupid gossip regarding you, for at least two days."  
Her tone became bitter and her expression was slightly betrayed by the anger behind it.

You soon came to a stop where you noticed that she had brought you into the corridor of the professor rooms.  
She pointed to the large pin board that hung between the information and the lounge room.  
She ran up to it with a joy that almost made her jump every third step and you laughed at the sight.

When she was right in front of it, she pointed to the - rather uninteresting looking list with five names on it and you scanned the names to make sure it wasn't one of the boys'.  
Hana took a pink pencil out of her shoulder bag, smiled at you, and wrote her name. Then she handed you the pen and looked at you with hopeful eyes.

"You are impossible," you said and paused, "BUT ... also the coolest."  
You copied her and wrote your name in small letters on the list so that it could not be recognized from far away.

"So what exactly are we going to do?" You wanted to know before you gave her the pen back, along with your lunchbox, which you finally had found.

“I think we get a list of plant names and pictures that we all have to collect by the end of the trip. They are then used by the others for their bachelor thesis ... or projects and presentations."  
After you gave her everything and she linked her arm with yours again, you left the hallway together.

"I hope the accommodation is cozy!" She said and was already daydreaming.

"Imagine we have a whole forest next to us. Maybe a small lake? Oh, oh ... I bet you, the food will be good." Her enthusiasm infected you. "Everything will definitely be fresh! I hope we can do a barbecue“, She already seemed to rave about the food.

"If it's not too cold, why not?" You threw in and the two of you snorted.

"Professor Furuya will definitely let us know tomorrow."

"Did you talk to him before we signed up?" You asked and Hana laughed into her fist and nodded.

"Of course," she said, her voice two octaves higher, "he was still missing some volunteers, so he will be happy about us. He wanted to leave yesterday, but when he saw only five names on his list, he decided to wait and gather more students. So if everything goes well, we will go this Friday! "

_**▪︎ ♧ ▪︎** _

Hana had been right.  
The very next day you were given informations from Professor Furuya regarding the trip.  
He announced that the date was set.  
You should meet coming Friday in front of the main entrance, where a bus would pick you all up. He asked you to come on time and assured that everything else would be taken care of. Of course you also needed a bag because you would spend the night there.

You and Hana were extremely happy.  
Immediately after you went to find him and get all the information, you happily went outside and talked about all the activities that you could hopefully do there.  
The next day, your only topic of the day was the trip, for which you used various nicknames, so that nobody understood what you were talking about - just to play it safe. Especially not the seven familiar faces that even the kind-hearted Hana no longer trusted.

Since the day in the cafeteria, when they had sat down at your table and asked her to leave you alone with them, she couldn't trust them. The many comments from the girls around you did not help convince her otherwise.   
However, you thought... it was better that way. Hana drew you protectively in a different direction when she saw them, made a wide circle around them when you had to go past them and occasionally glared at them.  
The only one she still greeted was Satori, but even him, she found suspicious.

The days flew by.  
Before you knew it, it was Friday and Hana and you barely got a wink of sleep. You were like kids looking forward to an excursion so much that they couldn't sleep the night before.

You had sent messages to each other half the night. It was nothing new for you not to be able to sleep.

Still, the excitement you felt was welcomed. It was a difference not being able to sleep because various pairs of eyes were chasing you in your dreams, or looking forward to something so much that you couldn't close your eyes in anticipation.

You had just finished packing your bag, filled up the water and food for Tofu and told your mother to drop by in the evening to make sure your cat was fine. You liked to be over-cautious on that subject.

You had cleared your pin board again since the dissolution and confirmation of your theory. There were small, colorful notes on it again, along with photos or important dates that you didn't want to forget. That was a good thing because your mother would have declared you crazy if she had seen the old state of it.

The threads, the names ... the theories.  
You shook briefly.  
You didn't even want to imagine what she would have thought. 

The last thing you did was grab your jacket, shoes and give Tofu a kiss on the fluffy area between his ears, whereupon he already started to lift his paw. If you hadn't already practiced stealing a kiss and pulling your head back immediately, he would have scratched you.

Hana and you met in front of the entrance, where four other girls were already talking to each other. They didn't seem particularly interested in you or Hana, which you were definitely preferring that way.   
On the way there you had stolen a few glances at the Takoyaki booth, whose blinds were closed all the way down today. Far and wide no grandmother, or Afuru.

A shy student you had never seen before was standing further away with a heavy backpack on his back and seemed to be looking a little nervous.

You were complete. These were all seven now.

The bus that was parked in front of the street looked gigantic. It was one of the larger models and you noticed that not only were you surprised by the choice of the bus, but also the four girls who stole a look towards the bus and didn't understand why that one was needed for such a small group.

You might have noticed it earlier if you hadn't been so caught up in your anticipation, but when the girls next to you suddenly started talking louder, you looked up in surprise.

"Maybe it won't be as boring as we thought, girls," said one of them and smiled.

You could only stare forward with your mouth hanging open and saw the large group of guys coming towards you, who made even Hana speechless.  
At the forefront were familiar faces, at the sight of which you began to curse softly.

"No. Fucking. Way.“ You said through clenched teeth and also discovered Professor Furuya, who was walking next to them, while trying to get an overview.

"There are so many!" Remarked one of the other girls.

She was right. There were far too many. Not only that it was the boys you tried to avoid anyway, even though your heart threw a fit every time, no, their friends were there too.

Two dozen men surely made their way to the bus right now, one taller than the other. Between them you also recognized Kenma and Kunimi, with whom you were already somewhat familiar.

Professor Furuya stopped in front of you and his face was so bright you were afraid of being blinded.

"What luck we have," he said, clapping his hands, "what luck we have!"

"That explains the bus," whispered Hana, as shocked as you.

"I was worried that we wouldn't be many, but just look at the many volunteers we could still collect. A special thank you to the volleyball players who forwarded the message that we are still looking for a couple of people“, Informed the professor and suddenly started waving at someone.  
You recognized Professor Nakano, who joined them with a large bag.

"Since we are now a total of 25 students, I had to get Professor Nakano as a help who will accompany us spontaneously." The older professor smiled gratefully at the young professor. She handed him a list and stood next to him.

You avoided eye contact, but Hana, who clutched your arm and reflected your tense posture, seemed to want to tell you what she saw.

" _They're_ staring at you," she said, feeling uncomfortable being watched, "especially Iwaizumi."

You sighed - wanted to pretend that it was just a little inconvenience that didn't particularly bother you, but that wasn't true. You were nervous. The thought that you would be locked up on the bus with them and that you would have to spend a night with them in the same place, made a shiver run down your spine.

"Please line up so we can count and check the names." Professor Furuya called out.

Kenma, standing next to Kuroo and pressing the buttons of his Nintendo Switch, was now trying to sneak away. He wanted to get behind one of the taller boys and turn around, when Kuroo's hand already clawed into the hood of his sweater and made sure that he couldn't.

"Where are you going?" Asked the black-haired male with a crooked smile.

Kenma made a barely noticeable face - the look, as always, very indifferent.

"Yaku is here. You don't need me," he said, pointing to the equally smaller classmate who was on the other side of Kuroo.

"Hey, _you_ thought I hadn't talked to you a lot in the past few weeks" - his head snapped up to focus on you for just a split second - "and now you're trying to get away? Even Hinata is coming."

Kenma seemed a little more willing now, hearing Hinata's name and immediately looked around since he hadn't seen him yet.  
As if on cue, there was suddenly a loud “Wait for us!” to be heard.

Hinata, with the striking orange hair, came running, visibly sleepy. There were two other boys behind him. The blond one seemed to be in a bad mood before the trip even started, while the brown-haired boy almost tripped over his feet as he tried to keep up with them.

"Ah, there they are," Kuroo said, grinning.

"Shoyo," Kenma said surprised.

The three came to a halt and bowed to the professors because they were late.  
When the boys all lined up and even the girls joined in, the shy boy, Hana, and you did the same.

You stubbornly looked to the front while Hana's warm hand was still on your arm. Professor Furuya went past everyone with the list and crossed off the names of those present.  
There were names that you had never heard of, but you were sure to get to know them well today. 

Kuroo smiled strangely conspiratorially in your and sometimes Bokuto's direction half the morning. You were unsure whether the calm guy whom the professor had identified as Akaashi actually made Bokuto calmer or more active. But the calm black-haired male was already very familiar with Bokuto's energetic and fast changing mood.   
Kenma had smiled at you for a moment and you wanted to think that even though he was hanging on his Switch all the time, he was happy to be here, especially at Kuroo's side.

Lev had already gotten close to you without having said a word to you, which meant that Hinata was standing close to you and Hana as well. Oikawa didn't seem to like that at all and stared venomously in Lev's direction, but kept a certain distance, which Iwaizumi appreciated. Distance or not, even he didn't seem to be able to take his eyes off you, and you grew tense with every passing second.

Satori had thrown a casual "good morning" in your direction when you walked by and had happily called his friends' names. The one with the light hair, whom he had called Semi, looked a bit grumpy and the black-haired one next to him, who looked at Hana, you and the other girls with slightly flushed cheeks, and asked again - to be sure - whether you girls would come along too, was addressed as Goshiki.

Terushima and his friend had already gone to the group of girls and introduced themselves personally, whereupon the girls giggled and took him and Bobata into their small formation and stood together in a circle in front of the bus.

Kunimi, whom you already knew from some courses, stood together with Kindaichi, whose name you could quickly memorize because he was so easily recognizable with his hairstyle. They hardly seemed to notice the others, but sometimes looked over at Oikawa and Iwaizumi, who almost forgot that the younger students even existed.

You didn't know exactly why the tall blond boy and the brown-haired one with the freckles were there, since they both looked the least interested, but you shrugged and wanted to turn to Professor Furuya.  
He had announced after checking off his list, that everyone should get into the bus in five minutes so they could then drive off on time, but you wanted to let the professor know that you wouldn't make it. Cat sick or something. You would think of an excuse.

You had just lifted your index finger to draw attention to yourself and opened your mouth to start speaking, but you were already pulled back before you could take a step forward.

"Well, well," said a voice immediately behind you, "we're not thinking of leaving, are we?"  
Kuroo looked at you with a mischievous expression on his face, his teeth flashed dangerously and his hand had clawed into your jacket.

You wanted to answer, but you noticed Professor Furuya turning and looking the other way. The chance of having a conversation with him waned every second. Especially when you noticed that Oikawa and Iwaizumi were standing in front of him and apparently involved him in an extremely long conversation.

"We have to get on the bus in thirty seconds," noted Lev, his gigantic hand resting on your head and lingering there, while Kuroo pulled you further and further until you could literally feel him on your back.

"Well noted," said the black-haired man. "Uh oh, what do you think, kitten? Can you still talk to him? "

You tried to look out for Hana, but the guys around you blocked your view.

"I could scream," you threatened, trying to get him to let go by putting your body weight forward and making it harder for him to pull you back.

"Nineteen seconds," Lev patted your head. The smile - as always - a little suspicious.

Kuroo quickly put his arm around your shoulders and you almost fell forward together. His body weight with yours, which was shifted forward, had brought you out of balance and his hand found your face, where he pressed into your cheeks. Your mouth was pushed out and you could hardly say a word while he was teasing you. You felt like a little child.

And then Professor Furuya's voice was heard, announcing that everyone should get on the bus now, as they were ready to leave.

You muttered to yourself and tried to pull yourself away to find Hana.  
If he had wanted to keep holding you, he would have, but you could easily move away from him.

The three of you stood right in front of the bus door and Kuroo and Lev puffed up like big birds in front of you. They looked gigantic in front of you, hands on their waist, shoulders wide and chest pushed out.  
You could have walked past them, but your legs carried you away before your mind could intervene.  
One step at a time until your back hit the bus door. You ran inside like a scared animal, afraid to get eaten.

You took a seat somewhere in the middle of the bus, waiting for Hana, who would surely sit next to you or near you. The bus was big enough for everyone to have a row to themselves.  
It was strange to see how most of them gravitated to the back of the bus. The four other girls sat down in the front.

Hana came to your row, but sat down at the window seat opposite yours. So you both enjoyed the view and were able to put your bags on the empty seat next to you.  
She smiled at you, a smile that made sure that no matter what came, she was here with you, by your side. It was a rarely warm feeling that flooded you at the sight of it.

You had already remembered the names of all those who were present, although you knew one or the other.  
The group that originally consisted of seven, had all settled in front.  
Not far from you, however, were also Tsukishima and Yamaguchi, who had copied you and Hana and took a seat in the same row but away from eachother.   
The rest of them were scattered around the back, where you, as stubborn as you were, didn't even want to turn to.

Finally, the two professors came in, who had a short chat with the bus driver and organized some papers.  
You stared skeptically at Hana, who giggled when she saw Professor Furuya's confused expression.  
There hadn't been much else said. They wanted to arrive before eight o'clock.  
The drive alone would take you a good two hours, maybe an hour and a half if the streets weren't too packed. You prayed it would be quick. You didn't think you could survive being locked up on the bus longer with the seven guys that haunted your dreams every night.

A few bags were still being stowed that were too big to take up to the bus, and Professor Furuya carried another bag with him, which he placed in the first row, where no one was sitting.  
You assumed it was the snacks for the drive there.

Now that you knew everyone's name, you were able to classify the five faces that were further up the front.  
The four girls all sat in one row, while Hoshino and Tokiwa sat next to each other and Shinozaki with Minami.  
Mukai, the rather insecure boy, sat two rows behind and had taken out a book to read.

"First of all - good morning," said Professor Furuya, when you heard the bus' motor, "I am glad that you appeared in such a large number!"  
With a simple gesture, he also asked Professor Nakano forward.

“We have snacks for the travel here, which we will hand out later. In addition, we have created lists for everyone, which we will also hand out later. You can search in teams or discuss as a large group and divide the work so that we successfully reach our end goal. As you already know, we will spend one night there and dinner and tomorrow's breakfast is already taken care of. The university kindly let us have this bus, so please don't leave any rubbish or crumbs behind. The drive there should take an hour and a half and we will make a short stop in an hour. Please don't get up unless we ask you to."  
After the little speech, it was quiet for a moment until the professors sat down.

Sounds immediately came from the back of the bus and it quickly became very loud - judging the number of students it wasn't surprising.

Tsukishima had put on headphones before you even turned into the next street, while his row-partner looked silently out of the window, smiling.

You had sunk into your seat and tried to close your eyes. Bus rides always made you sleepy and for some reason, even though you shouldn't be able to sleep due to your nervousness, your eyelids felt heavy.

Before you knew it, Hana shook you awake and you sat up drowsily.  
She had sat next to you to wake you up and wordlessly pointed out the window, where she signaled that the stop that was mentioned was coming.  
You had slept like a baby.  
Atypical for you.  
Even now, when you wanted to remember any dreams, you couldn't. You slept well and that amazed you.

"We will take a short break at a rest area," Professor Furuya announced, "no longer than fifteen minutes, please. We want to be there before 8:15 a.m. at the least!"

Before the words left his mouth, the majority had jumped up and gathered in front of the bus door at the back. You wanted to avoid being trampled to death and stayed seated. Hana as well.

The bus driver opened both doors and left them open. A wind pulled through the bus and you trembled slightly.  
Hana put headphones in her ears and you were looking for an activity to keep yourself busy as well, but you noticed Professor Furuya stumble through the rows.  
He looked into every row to make sure no one had left a mess and was ready to scold them once they were back, but he surprisingly came back empty-handed and then stopped next to you.

“We will give out the Onigiri when everyone is back. Would you mind helping me and Professor Nakano out?"  
He smiled gently at you, but you had to restrain yourself not to make an annoyed face. You would rather do anything else, but you just nodded in response and reluctantly let yourself be persuaded.  
He had little choice but to speak to you.  
Everyone was outside, except for you, Hana and Mukai, the shy boy who was sitting in front of you and was looking rather panicky to his right and left. Hana wanted to remain undisturbed, which is why he had spoken to you.

He signaled you to follow him and you got up and followed with shaky legs.  
Together you went to the very front to the first and second rows, where the bags were, which he had so laboriously carried up. He took out a large box with several packaged supermarket Onigiri sticking out of it.

"It's just a little snack. We'll have lunch later,” he assured you when he noticed your skeptical look and unpacked another box. There were little milk boxes in there; some banana milk and some other strawberry milk.

"Don't even ask who wants to drink what. They can swap among themselves.“, He advised you and put both boxes onto a free seat.  
It would be good if everyone were sitting exactly one behind the other so that you could just pass them through to the back, but because the bus was so big and there were so many rows unoccupied, it was impossible.

Logically, you waited until everyone was back and sitting in their seats again. Professor Nakano had counted all of them and then Professor Furuya started to give them out, which is why you immediately followed suit.  
You always took three onigiri and three of the small milk boxes and went to the back where you started with Tsukishima and Yamaguchi. They all said thank you diligently and it was kind of cute as some of them couldn't wait till you got to their row.  
Hinata, for example, almost jumped out of his seat when you gave him his snacks.  
He made "ah" and "oh", opened the packaging so quickly and mumbled a "thank you" into the Onigiri. You had to laugh.  
You and Professor Furuya tried not to step onto eachother feet as you walked back and forth to distribute the last few.

You arrived at Bokuto's row, who had a big grin on his face. The eyes sparkled almost the same way as Hinata's and you were almost surprised at how different he looked today. You handed him two onigiri and one banana and one strawberry milk, so he could pass it to his friend next to him. Akaashi just looked at him briefly, then offered him his onigiri. He seemed to know Bokuto's healthy appetite well, especially now that it was intensified by whatever lurked in him.

Kuroo and Kenma were sitting behind him. The smaller of the two sat at the window with his switch and looked up briefly when you held the food and drink in front of him.  
He smiled at you and whispered a "thank you" and Kuroo turned his head in surprise.

"Wow," he said, "you just smiled at someone? Out of courtesy? You don't see that every day.”  
Kenma just sank even more into his seat and sullenly tapped the buttons on his console.  
But you couldn't help but notice the dynamics between them.

It had changed, something had settled and fallen back into place and Kenma seemed to feel that too. It seemed like before, which surprised you a lot more than it did him.  
You had to admit that there was a different kind of energy floating around the boys today. It felt liberating.

You arrived at Oikawa and Iwaizumis row with no further problems or comments. The black-haired male stared at you steadily, but didn't dare to speak to you. No word came out of him and you were quite surprised about it.  
Then you heard Oikawa giggle.  
But he too stayed quiet and let you go on and you almost expected him to say something. As a precaution, you turned to him again and saw him sitting there innocently and stabbing the straw into his milk. He seemed to notice that you were staring at him and before you could look away, your eyes met and he stuck out his tongue boldly.

The next ones were Terushima and Bobata, who watched and laughed on their cell phones the entire time. When you got to them, Bobata looked at his blonde friend knowingly, who gave you a cheeky smile.  
Your eyes became slits and you glared at him, but Terushima just handed his cell phone to you.

"Do you want to give me your number today?" He asked and before you could even answer, various hands and arms appeared in front of you.  
Whether it was Oikawa and Iwaizumi trying to pull him forward on his jacket, or Kuroo, who had gotten up and leaned back over two seats to get to him.

Everyone tried to push him away from you without the same force that had spurted out the last time. This time they seemed to nag on him like brothers.

"Leave her alone" - "Terushima, you never change" - "keep your hands to yourself" - "you really try this shit too often" - "how many girl numbers do you already have?"  
Almost everyone on the bus left a comment about the flirty volleyball player, who could hardly save himself or his reputation. Hinata laughed into his fist while Akaashi tried to get Bokuto back in his seat. Bobata next to Terushima had turned his head towards the window and was trying not to laugh out loud.  
You were frozen for a few seconds, but when everyone had sat down again, as carefree as they had been earlier, while maintaining the still comfortable mood - you started laughing.

You stood there among the many guys and laughed. And you couldn't stop, you just kept laughing; about the facial expressions of the others, about Terushima, who sat there with his arms crossed and a pout on his face, while murmuring "no one here knows how to have fun" and ultimately also because the others laughed. You hadn't experienced such a mood in a long time and you were absorbed in it like a thirsty flower in the rain.

You distributed the rest of the onigiri and drinking packs with a smile on your face.  
You sat back in your seat with a new feeling and smiled at Hana, who looked at you curiously.

"Are you already in a good mood?", She asked and also had to smile.

"Somehow, yes," you replied honestly and then looked ahead again.

Another hour passed before this time Professor Nakano stood up and turned to all of you.  
The scenery confirmed that you would be arriving soon. There were only a few buildings seen until they disappeared completely and from time to time only one or the other house was visible.  
Although it was getting cool, the grass was still green and the trees still had most of their leaves hanging from their branches. It was nice to see how the sun kept coming out and shined into the bus as if even the weather wanted to play along today.

"So listen up, please," the younger professor called and stood when the bus was no longer driving as fast as it was in the city. "We will arrive soon and I would like to briefly explain what we will do today and tomorrow. You will all get some papers now" - she took Professor Furuya’s stapled papers to show what they looked like - "All the plant names are on these, along with their pictures. We have marked which types of plants are particularly important, which we therefore need in particular, or how many we need of them. These are marked in red."  
She pointed a finger at a plant whose name you couldn't read from where you were sitting. You barely made out what it looked like, but the little picture in the right corner had a red frame.

“The pictures marked in yellow are the ones we need, of which there are not many and which tend to come in second place, when talking about importance. The plants marked in green are the ones that are very common. We can always use them, but they are not as important as the yellow and red ones. You can form groups or coordinate with each other and distribute the work, but it would be good to keep an eye on how many plants you collect and keep a good record of them. We trust that you can regulate this as well as possible, so please do not forget that a group or a person should always make a list and pay attention to what the others are doing so that we do not end up with only green marked plants and go home because everyone trusts that the plants marked in red have already been found by someone else.”

Professor Furuya now got up and thanked Nakano for explaining before adding:

"You will soon see that we will work in the middle of a large field. Behind it is a forest, where one or the other plant may also grow. We don't want you to go too far, but of course you can look around everywhere. In addition to the field there is also a greenhouse that was only made available for us. As some of you know, our university helps various farmers. We support them for our agricultural projects. That means everything in the green house has been planted for us, but if it is not absolutely necessary, please do not take _everything_ out of there, since we make these trips every three months. So not only are the plants used today there, but also those that other students may need in a few months. So there should be something left for the next students, but you can move about as freely and be as curious as you like. There are no restrictions in the greenhouse, so please do not be afraid. The owners of this land will let us live with them, so please don't make a mess. When you dig something out, clear up behind yourself. At 2:00 p.m. there is a small meal and in the evening there is a large dinner.”  
With these words he turned to Professor Nakano and the two talked briefly about the distribution of the sheets, but the boys in the back of the bus were already looking forward to getting off the bus.

After everyone held such a sheet in their hands, you flipped through the pages to see if you found something familiar - the names were sometimes so difficult to pronounce that you didn't even try - you felt the bus slow down. Professor Furuya did another round from front to back to see if there was garbage somewhere and had said with satisfaction that you had finally arrived.  
When the bus finally came to a stop and you were allowed to get off the bus, the majority stormed out and you heard the loud and excited voices before you got off, too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Leave me some comments, please? 
> 
> If you have any suggestions, questions or ideas I would love to hear them!
> 
> You can also write me on tumblr if you are interested to beta read, since I've seen some comments about that!  
> Under kuwuroo
> 
> Thank you for reading, I really don't know where I would be or where this fanfic would have ended if I didn't have so many readers it really warms my heart that you guys like this fanfic and aaaa thank you.


	13. hatsukoi pt. 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> fluff, fluff, fluff, cute shit, cuuuuute shit, haikyuu characters being haikyuu characters and then i sprinkled down some major angst into this chapter as well!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> God, okay... this chapter is my longest in history and it took me so long to write and then translate dsudhuhdijffigfg it was a pain in the ass ngl! So that took quite long, I'm sorry! 
> 
> Anyway I hope you guys enjoy the cute interactions, the change of scenery and the many other characters being goofy!

> _**xx return to me return to me return to me return to me return to...** _ _**me? xx** _

The large group stood on the side of the road - their faces lit up. The earth under your feet became softer the more people trampled on it. The earth next to the road had been shaken up and you had to be careful where you stepped onto.  
A small breach had emerged and the earth around it had connected to another dirt road that led to the small, traditional house.

The house was three-stories big and brown. It looked like it was from an old picture book, so perfectly reproduced that you were amazed. The field next to it extended to the back of the house, while the greenhouse was on the other side of the building. If you narrowed your eyes, you recognized not only the forest that started further away, but also other houses whose roofs were the only thing that you could really see. They were built in the same style and also had fields adjacent to their houses.

The older couple who had been waiting for you now came the long way from the house to the highway, where you still stood to greet you. They were quite small, or maybe it was just the difference that became even clearer when they stopped in front of the boys. 

"Welcome," they said at the same time and turned directly to Professor Furuya, who was already familiar with them. "You brought us some tall and broad boys today ...", you heard the older woman say before Professor Nakano signaled you to follow her.  
Together you went towards the house and the elderly gentleman came with you.

You were quickly shown around and were told in which room you would sleep. You had put your bags down and agreed to meet in front of the house in ten minutes.  
The boys were on the second floor because the rooms were larger there and they were in the majority. You girls were taken to the third floor, where the roof took up quite a bit of space from the rooms, but you were only seven with Professor Nakano, so that wasn't a big problem. The bedding was in the closets and you would distribute and spread everything out later. For now, you had put all your bags in the room and were killing time until the ten minutes were over.

"... so many boys", - you overhead some snippets of a conversation between Professor Furuya and Professor Nakano - "that was a little sudden, but they are happy about it. The bedding in our rooms won't be enough, do you have some extra? "

"I think this is so nice," said a voice behind you and Hana came down the stairs to link her arm with yours. "The house is so cute!"  
You smiled at her.

"Everything is so traditional," you commented and she nodded excitedly. 

"I took the papers and some pens with me,“ Hana said.  
Together you went down the stairs and out to the house threshold to put your shoes back on.  
While waiting for the others in front of the house, you went through the papers that had been given to you.

"Mhm look, Hana. They have peppermint on the list”, you pointed to the picture and the name. Its picture had a yellow frame - so semi important.

"I love the smell," she said, "the scientific name is-"  
She was about to read what was written underneath. The scientific names had been added a little smaller, but someone got ahead of her.

"Mentha Pipe Rita," someone said proudly, and you recognized the voice before you even turned around.  
Kuroo stood behind you with his arms crossed in front of his chest, a confident smile on his face.  
He didn't have the papers with him, nor could he have read it from your list.

"Wow ... someone knows his way around," said Hana, a little impressed.  
Yaku, who had just talked to Lev, looked at you.

"Are you showing off your plant knowledge again," asked the smaller male.  
Kuroo's smile instantly vanished.

"Excuse me!" He cried out, "you know the term; ruining the moment, huh? "  
The black-haired male boiled up and towered over Yaku, putting his hands on his waist.

"Do you always have to show off like this? Nobody says Mentha Pipe Rita ... by the way, could you please stop looking down at me like this?! "  
Kenma stood by and seemed to be typing on his cell phone rather than getting involved and Hana and you were a little lost in the discussion, but neither of you could have said the scientific name so easily, which is why you were sure that not only was Kuroo pretty clever, but Yaku was too.

"Oh, really? You're wasting your oxygenium here!"

"Yeah, okay, grandfather," said Yaku, glaring at the taller one.

"I didn't know you had so much ... knowledge about this topic," you said to Kuroo. He had talked a little bit of nonsense, but you could safely say that this exchange wasn‘t a rare one. He actually seemed to know his stuff.

"Did you know about this, Kenma?" You asked, wanting to involve him after that day when he came to you, worried about Kuroo being somewhat different.

"Hm?", he said softly and his eyes were still on the phone display, "oh yes, he knows about plants ..."  
Plants, science, and you even wanted to go so far as to think he was good at chemistry too, but you kept quiet.

You only now realized that you didn't even know what his major was. You had always assumed that it was sports, but because although he was actually two semesters above you and was at least once in one of your courses, no longer let you say with certainty whether you weren't totally wrong and secretly he was a little genius.

"Why are you staring at me so dreamily?" Kuroo suddenly asked, since you hadn't said anything for a long time and were literally lost in thought. You shook your head to come back to reality and saw his shape come forward. He was a little too close to you and you wanted to take a step backwards to create a little distance, but you bumped into someone before you could.

A deep sigh sounded behind you and Iwaizumi pressed himself into your field of vision as he now went aside so as not to bump into you again.  
He still didn't say a word to you and you were surprised that he was still calm and didn't pester you. The sigh confirmed that he was annoyed, but he walked past you without a word and stood a little further away from the group. The eyes still on you.

When the two professors arrived at your house, they showed you the entire property again and distributed pencils in case someone hadn't taken one with them.  
They informed you where you could get the necessary tools from like gloves and wheelbarrows. They had pointed towards the small tool shed, which was right behind the big field.

"We should split up into groups," Kuroo said when the professors let you go and everyone was a little lost.

Semi looked at him grumpily and turned to Satori.

"We should just do our own thing," he said and Satori shrugged and seemed to accept the suggestion.  
Kuroo's long arm reached for Semi and he pointed his index finger at him.

"We never get to our final goal like this," he said reproachfully.  
Semi crossed his arms over his chest.

"B-But Semi is right!" Goshiki shouted loudly, "there are so many of us, we will be fine alone!"

"We're here as a group, we should be willing to do some teamwork," Kuroo said, "or what do you think, Kenma?"  
The Kenma in question no longer typed on his cell phone, but seemed to want to vanish into the ground away from this argument.

"Well... it's going to be difficult if we all do our own thing ... I think," he still said softly and Kuroo started to grin proudly.

"We can first look around," suggested Hinata, who wanted to explore everything.

"Right, we can look around in small groups for the time being and then report and put together everything we have seen or found," said Akaashi, who had been standing quietly next to Bokuto the whole time.

"Shrimpy really said something clever," said Oikawa and smiled at Hinata, who wanted to snap shut at the name like a raven chick.

"Yeah...", Terushima came out and stood directly in the middle of the whole group, "I'm doing my own thing, let‘s go, Bobata"  
And with these words he grabbed his long-time friend and went towards the Greenhouse.

"He's so cool," you heard Hoshino say and Minami giggled before the two decided to follow Terushima.

"Let's just start looking, I feel good about this," Bokuto looked at his friends with a challenging expression. "I will find more than anyone else!"  
This seemed to bother Lev a lot, because the greed in him definitely did not want to lose against the older one and rather be better - find and bring back more plants than he would.

"Challenge accepted!" He said with a sparkle in his eyes. "Come on Hinata, you heard him. We have to find more than him!"  
Hinata clapped his hands once and a fire flashed in his eyes that almost scared you.

"YES!" He shouted and together they went towards the big field.

"Shoyo ..." Kenma said and almost wanted to run after him, but Kuroo, who was now annoyed, stepped in front of his smaller friend before he walked away as well.

"These brats," Kuroo and Oikawa said at the same time and it suddenly became very quiet.

"Never do that again", it followed from both of their mouths and they looked at each other with a shocked expression.

"This is getting a little too crazy for me," you said, and before Kuroo and Oikawa decided to merge into one and become the same person, you grabbed Hana and wanted to look around without anyone telling you what to do.

After you also left the group in front of the house, many others followed suit.  
Tsukishima and Yamaguchi walked away with no care in anyone else and decided to explore the entire property. The forest that bordered the back garden seemed tempting to you and Hana, too.  
Tokiwa and Shinozaki walked arm in arm around the green house and seemed to be running around a little lost, but you couldn't resent the two girls. It was jsut a little strange at the moment.  
All of you were simply thrown together and were now expected to work together as a group, even though you were so many and some of you were strangers.

Oddly enough, Mukai was the first to actually start looking around and had already identified some plants. He wasn't far from finding something that was on the list, which is why there was a new problem.  
Everyone was so scattered and in their own worlds, that no one kept a record, like Professor Furuya and Professor Nakano had wanted one of you to do.

You had learned that behind the house where the field ended, the forest started and the green house was close by, there were some plastic boxes. They were perfect to transport them back home, but who would plant them inside to make them ready for tomorrow?

You pulled Hana with you.  
When you got there, your concern seemed confirmed. The boxes were still stacked on top of each other and there was no soil inside, making them rather useless.

"We should put them all next to each other," you said to Hana and pointed to the high pile. "Mukai is about to find some plants and I suspect it won't be long before others will follow his example and then we have several people here who don't know what to do with the plants."

"Oh, right," Hana scratched the back of her head, "I'll get two shovels and we can put the soil inside!"

"Good idea!", You confirmed and she immediately went to the tool shed.

It didn't take long for Hana, but when she came back you had already taken most of the boxes from the stack and lined them up side by side. Inside were pots, also made of plastic - you couldn't imagine transporting that many ceramic pots back safely - and you left them as they were.  
There were always eight pots in a box and you were already counting how much you could take with you and wondering if they had more.  
Hana stepped to your side with light steps and watched you briefly before she handed you a shovel.

“Let's first fill up two boxes with earth so that it doesn't go to waste. Because I really don't know if the boys will find any plant at all.”

And you were so wrong, so so wrong.  
You were right with Mukai. He was the first to come up to you with a plant and didn't expect you to be so busy.  
Since no one else came up to you, Hana and you decided that you would keep protocol, which is why Professor Furuya gave you a writing board to take turns writing down what you already had and how many of them. It worked out pretty well, you consulted eachother accordingly and it was even fun until ... what you said came back to kick your ass.

After Mukai came Kuroo, who started a competition with Yaku and brought so many plants to you that you could hardly keep up for the first half hour.  
After an hour, everyone had already submitted something, which made the search considerably more difficult.  
Many had only found the green-marked plants, or one of the red-marked plants, just because they looked quite similar to another less important plant.  
Hana and you sometimes had some difficulties in correctly distinguishing the plants, but Kuroo had come to your aid one time or another.  
He wouldn't admit it - maybe because he was having a bit of a problem with his proud ego - but he seemed to enjoy the fact that most of them couldn't get around working in a big group, like he originally suggested.

After the whole first wave of rush, it got calmer.  
Hana and you used this time to arrange the already full boxes so that you placed them side by side by importance.  
You filled the pots of two more boxes with earth and stood around a little lost.

You let your eyes wander around.  
Not too far away were Satori, Goshiki and Semi, who had been in each other's hair since they had arrived. Satori was crouching and studied the plants that grew near the forest while Goshiki had his hands on his waist and complained about the insects crawling around. Semi's mouth had become a single line and he tried not to bark at the younger black-haired male, who made it pretty difficult for him.

You still wanted to watch the three of them, somehow they amused you, but Bokuto and Akaashi brought you out of your mind as they jogged towards you.  
Bokuto stopped in front of you and Akaashi went over to the small terrace, where various flowers and plants grew. The greenery had grown so long, that it clung to the trees around it. Some thinner roots had struggled to the top and intertwined with the thick branches of the trees, where Akaashi now stood below and looked at it with interest.  
Plant leaves were hanging down so that it looked like a small gate made of roots, stems and leaves.

"I think I found something good," said Bokuto proudly and saw Kuroo coming closer - already bringing his next find. He had gloves on and had dug the plant cleanly out, the roots were hardly damaged. The same couldn‘t be said about whatever Bokuto was holding in his hands.  
He was holding a jumble of green up and was neither wearing protective gloves nor had taken it out with its roots. When he got closer, Hana drew in a sharp breath and you blinked a few times.

"Uhm ... Bokuto ...", Hana started a little uncertainly, "these are nettles. Aren‘t your hands burning? "

"Oh yeah... now that you mention it," he replied, grinning broadly.  
Kuroo, who had heard all of this, looked just like you and Hana did, and you were a little confused at how he had made the mix up.  
You went up to him and reached for his hands, which he was still squeezing together. The touch felt warm and for a few seconds he hardly felt the burning sensation on the palms of his hands, but the moment passed faster than desired. You pulled his hands apart and looked at him worriedly.

"Just let it go," you said with an encouraging tone, but he just kept looking at you and wished you had touched him for another second, at least a millisecond longer.

"You idiot," exclaimed Kuroo suddenly and that was your cue to go back to Hana's side and stand in the background again. He had handed Hana the plant he had just been holding. There was a large herbal section on the lists, where his plant also fell into. He had brought you wild garlic and then dedicated himself to Bokuto.

Kuroo was rougher - understandably. He had grabbed his wrists and shaken them up and down while Akaashi had gone inside to find a soothing ointment that he hoped to find with the elderly couple or the professors.

You looked at Bokuto pitifully. His hands seemed to be on fire. He stubbornly held them out and let Kuroo's know-it-all attitude hit him, until Akaashi returned.  
Somehow he looked cute sitting on one of the small flat stones, all pouty.  
He seemed to have suffered various skin punctures when he wanted to tear the piece off, since wheals were already forming on his skin.  
Akaashi came back pretty quickly, an ointment in his hand that hopefully relieved the pain.

"That should help," he said, removing the lid to help his idiotic friend. "Be careful next time"

"Yeah and you don't just tear out any plants like that, you know," Kuroo advised, but Bokuto looked at him annoyed.

"Just wait!" He snapped, "I'll find more than you"

"Oh yeah?" Kuroo asked, visibly trying to provoke him further.

"Oh yeeeeaaaah," Bokuto replied and let Akaashi apply the ointment onto his hands, like he was a small child.

You looked back at Satori, who was still growing bored in front of the edge of the forest and pointed to a plant where he was shooing Goshiki to.  
The latter already had his hands full with two other plants they had found, a shovel and a glove that he had forgotten to put on and it was now too late, unless he gave the plants to you and Hana.  
But Satori knew how to successfully chase the younger one away.

"Ushiwaka said he couldn't make it and recommended you, you know. Said you could even find these plants all by yourself."  
Something flashed in Goshiki's eyes and he looked at the redhead with renewed energy.

"He did, didn't he? Yes, of course!" - he wanted to raise his arms triumphantly, but remembered that his hands were full - "I can do it, don't worry. I will find every single plant, of course I will. I'll show everyone here!”  
He ran towards the area Satori had just pointed at and Semi shook his head, slightly amused.

"You know how to motivate him," he said, somewhat proud and a little reproachful. He didn't expect Satori to do much, but couldn't help but feel a little sorry for Goshiki. But he always wanted to prove himself, so why not exceptionally in this field and not on the court.  
Satori winked at Semi and ignored the negative undertone that resonated in Semi's voice.

"I'm hungry," said Tendou, yawning loudly. "What time is it?"

"Uhh," Semi pulled out his cell phone, "it's 9:53 am"  
Another yawn escaped from the redhead.

"Still so looooooong," he commented, put his elbow on his knee and supported his head that way. He turned slightly so that he could look at you easily.

Your hair fell in your face and you tried to put a single strand behind your ear. Hana seemed to be saying something funny because you started laughing. Just briefly though, as if you were afraid to let happiness show on your face. Maybe you felt someone's eyes on you... after all, you were pretty good at interpreting the mood in the air.  
Your dark blonde friend pointed to the list you were holding and you turned a page over. She pointed to one of the pictures and you nodded.  
Satori wondered if you knew that the wind in your hair gave you a little special something.  
Your facial expression never showed what you thought about, somehow it never did, but your eyes looked around curiously.  
You did that often. Your entire face remained unchanged and disinterested, but your eyes widened, looked around, and made you look incredibly innocent. Like a young deer that didn't recognize the danger, that lurked behind the next tree.  
It was so entertaining to look at you and wonder what reaction one could tickle out of you next, if one tried hard enough.

"Hey," someone jerked his shoulder, "Satori?"  
Semi looked down at him with an irritated expression.

"Are you listening?"  
Satori scrambled to his feet and stretched his arms up in the air to remove the tiredness from his body. Somehow it didn‘t work.

"What did you say?" He asked and stole another look at you.

"I said Goshiki will be the next one to touch some nettles. We should hand in the things we already have."

"Ah," Satori forced a grin unto his face; the kind of grin that would scare Semi on the court, "okay!"

"You know," Semi started, arms crossed over his chest, "even Wakatoshi said that lately, you've been ..."  
Satori looked at him with his mouth half open. His eyelids were about to close and for some reason that expression made Semi stop and leave his sentence unsaid.

"Forget about it," he said, and they went to Goshiki, who was crawling on the floor on all fours, trying to run away from a caterpillar.

"What is it?" The redhead asked and Semi grimaced. He didn't want to discuss this with him, because even after all these years, Satori could still give him goosebumps.

"People have been talking a lot lately." Semi kicks a stone that flew a little further than he liked. "You and the others ... I don't know, I guess I've just never seen you so interested in a girl."  
Satori just shrugged.

"It's not quite what it looks like," he said, "I just like the look on her face."

"I ... think ... that's all part of being interested ..." Semi scratched the back of his head. Satori‘s comment was a little strange. He was still as unpredictable as when he first met him.

"Yo, Goshiki," Semi called out now. He stroked his ash-blonde hair and signaled the black-haired male to get up. "What are you doing down there?"  
He and Satori helped him up and Semi took the shovel and the glove that lay next to three dug out plants.

"Come on, take the plants, we're going to hand them over now," he said, and walked ahead.  
Goshiki followed quickly, and Satori slowed to a pace that made him trot after Goshiki.

When they arrived in front of you and Hana, Satori stood behind Goshiki, put his hands on his shoulders and pushed him in front of you.  
He came out once from his right side, then from his left and presented you to the younger student until his cheeks turned red.

"I-I ... found three things," he said a little shyly, his voice two octaves higher and loud.

"We," Semi corrected him.  
Hana took the plants from him one by one and you tried to identify and write them down.

"Wow," you said suddenly and Goshiki's eyes widened.

"What?!", he came running to the boxes and didn't really know what to expect, but your smile certainly wasn't it.

"You brought cress and two lemon balm plants. We haven't had lemon balm yet, good job. ”  
You smiled at him and the blush on his cheeks grew darker.

"Many don't dare to touch them, because they think it's a nettle plant," added Hana, giving him a thumbs up.  
Goshiki's confidence seemed to find him again.

"Of course," he said, "I have a good eye for things like that." He smiled wryly.

"Satori showed you which plants to take with you," Semi said indifferently and was already turning around to leave.

"H-Hey!" The black-haired male called after him, "ugh ... I'll find the next one!"  
He and Satori followed Semi, who didn't even turn as Goshiki addressed his fiery words.

But one last time Satori's head turned to look at you.

You reminded him of someone ...

_**▪︎ ♧ ▪︎** _

  
There was more forest behind the greenhouse. Oikawa and Iwaizumi had ventured in there and teamed up with Kindaichi and Kunimi.  
Kunimi stood loosely with his arms stuck to his side in front of a bush that Kindaichi had been staring at for five minutes.

"I think," he started, "that's on the list ... these leaves look like-"

"... all the other leaves too," Kunimi interrupted, looking bored at the leaves that his friend was trying so hard to describe. "Everything looks the same."

"What does that even mean?!" Kindaichi snapped at his friend.  
Iwaizumi and Oikawa stood only a few meters away, not caring about finding any plants.  
The brown-haired one was busy looking at flowers and throwing out a "hmm" every other minute, while Iwaizumi still couldn't take his eyes off you.  
Something had changed since the day in the classroom where you put your hand on his cheek.  
In him, but also in the others.

Lev, who previously only acted because of the game as he always did, now seemed to want to protect you sincerely, no matter what.  
Oikawa, who usually acted out of envy, couldn't avoid getting closer to you; the simple reason for that was because he enjoyed the feelings that you not only aroused in him but in all seven.  
He often felt a strong wave of jealousy, especially when he was thinking about how most of them had already brushed their hands over your skin.

What part of Iwaizumi's soul did you accidentally touch when you put your hand on his cheek, which had brought a tear out of him? Because neither he nor the others could recall a memory that had ever caused more than just malicious joy in the seven sinners.  
To which locked up and hidden parts of his soul did you have access to, that he had reacted in this way?  
In all of his memories there was none that had a feeling other than anger. Even if he won the game, that malicious glee that followed seemed too short.  
He remembered no time in his life when his anger had been replaced by another feeling.  
How did you do it with a single touch that didn't even last ten seconds?  
How did you make his heart contract painfully?

"Kunimi," Kindaichi said, panting and waving his free hand around, "help me out"  
He held onto a few leaves that he tried to pull out, half the bush coming off as well.

"Why did we take them again?" Asked Iwaizumi grumpily and finally took his eyes off you to look at his younger friends.

“Hanamaki and Matsukawa have to do tutoring all weekend,” said Oikawa, “but Kunimi and Kindaichi are still young. They can still learn something. Besides," - Oikawa smiled at Iwaizumi and held up a peace sign - "they can look for plants, while we rest."  
The brown-haired male only received a slap on the back of his head.

"You're a real asshole, do you know that? We are older, go and help them. "  
Oikawa rubbed the back of his head.

"Well, just say you miss me as captain," he said, sticking his tongue slightly out.  
Before Iwaizumi could kick him this time, he already went to help Kindaichi.

**_▪︎ ♧ ▪︎_ **

  
"So if you can't get up there, I can lift you up. Or have you grown since the last game?” Lev grinned cheerfully at Hinata, whose face immediately turned sour.

"How am I supposed to grow in such a short time?" Hinata asked, his voice loud and accusing. "And anyway; I can easily get there alone! I just need to jump!"  
Kenma rolled his eyes at Lev's comment.  
The three had been standing knee-deep in different bushes for half an hour, which they tried to identify together, while believing the other was wrong and they were right.

"Do you want to jump and try?" Lev teased defiantly.

"I know I can!" Hinata called back, pointing to the tall gray-haired student, who almost reached the branch above them if he moved around too much.  
The tree wasn‘t important. They were supposed to collect plants after all, but Lev had pretended for fun that he could touch the first few branches that hung above them without jumping up, which had turned out to be true.  
Which is why he and Hinata had been doing nothing for ten minutes other than seeing who could touch the highest branch.

They had reached a branch that Lev could only touch with a jump, but Hinata wasn‘t feeling hopeless, yet.  
He concentrated on the thick branch that he could touch with a perfect jump through two other branches. Everyone had only one try, so the first jump had to get him high enough.  
He crouched and without thinking about it, he pushed himself off and jumped so high that he almost touched the branch if he had just stretched his arm out.  
His body flew up, almost levitated for a second and it felt as if wings had grown him and time stood still.  
He saw the branch that Lev had touched a minute ago, poked his head out between two other lower hanging branches and touched the higher one with glee.  
Kenma's face lit up.

"Wow, well done, Shoyo," he called up to Hinata and Lev looked after his orange-haired friend in awe.  
It would have gone perfectly had it not been for the gravity that had thwarted Hinata.  
His t-shirt got tangled on the branch to his right, while his arm lay over the branch to his left, so as not to lose his balance and fall badly.

He was fine, it was just a little shock, but on his T-shirt, which he had to tear free, there was now a big hole on the side.  
He jumped down to where Lev and Kenma immediately supported him in case he lost his balance.

"Argh," Hinata pulled the shirt down to take a closer look at the hole, "That was my favorite shirt ..."  
Lev snorted and Kenma shook his head.

"Can we just keep looking for plants?" He asked, visibly concerned. He feared worse if they continued to play.

"Then I guess I won!" Came Lev.

"HUH," Hinata pointed at him, "that's unfair! I touched the branch too! "

"You almost came crushing down, it doesn't count," Lev laughed and patted Hinata on the head.  
He tried to push the other man's big hand away and respond, until he noticed the berry bush behind Lev.

"Hey, aren't those red currants?" Hinata asked, pointing to the bush.

"I don't know," replied Lev, who pulled his hand back and turned around to look.

"In middle school we had a herbalism club and a friend of mine always showed us which berries are edible ... I think the red ones were fine ..."  
Lev picked some and rolled them around in his hand.

"Are you sure, Shoyo?" Kenma picked one berry and looked at it closely.  
  
"I don't know, maybe I'm wrong," Hinata laughed nervously and picked up a few berries to examine them.

"I think Hinata is right," said Lev.  
Kenma looked uncertainly at the two and then looked back into the palm of his hand where the lonely berry was still lying.  
A rustle followed and Kuroo suddenly appeared behind them.

"Hey, we- ... what are you kids doing?", He asked and saw the three younger ones standing in front of the berry bush. Their heads were all hanging down as they stared at the berries and wanted to find out if they were actually edible.

"You didn't think about eating them, right? They are highly toxic.” Kuroo pressed closer and was able to confirm his suspicion. Arum berries - definitely poisonous.  
The black-haired man had fallen into a pose, like a strict father who was about to scold his children.  
They were not far from the greenhouse, so they could see all the other students if they turned the other way from where Kuroo had just come out from.  
At that moment Tsukishima and Yamaguchi walked by, who had heard more, than Hinata would have liked.

"... they really were about to end up in the hospital, thanks to Hinata," the blond boy had said and Hinata had turned towards them to mumble something after him, but remained silent.

Tsukishima and Yamaguchi had found something of everything. Most of all, Yamaguchi enjoyed nature and knew a few plants, which made it easy for him. Tsukishima took it as a relaxing excursion that took him a little away from home, the crowded college and the stress of the exams. He hadn't wanted to say yes when Hinata asked him. He wanted to say no, snort and ask why Hinata would even dare to ask, but Yamaguchi got all excited and accepted before Tsukishima was able to answer. Hinata had written their names on the list too, and Professor Furuya had been right there, making it impossible to explain the situation and excuse himself. Tsukishima had been in a bad mood the rest of the day, but Yamaguchi had tried to make the trip nice for him and somehow managed to get along. Somewhere it was fun to watch Hinata almost poison himself.

"Wow," Hana said when the two arrived in front of you, "another plant that we haven't had yet. You are really good!"  
You nodded and smiled at Yamaguchi, who was happy to make you smile. You took the plant and planted it in the last free plastic pot in the box in front of you. Another box that you had successfully filled up!

"You should take a break, we don't much time left. Dinner is only a few hours away, but Professor Furuya has told me that we have collected so much that we can stop at 3p.m. You two are one of the few who have contributed a lot, so you can also be one of the first to rest.” You informed them and smiled - this time your smile was for both of them.

"About time...“ Tsukishima mumbled.

"Thank you!" Yamaguchi said, "that means we can explore the creek."

"What?" The blond boy sighed wearily, "well, I'm going into the house first"  
He was already starting to leave when Hana intervened.

"A creek?" She asked excitedly, "Where?"  
Yamaguchi giggled slightly.

"If you go towards the greenhouse and from there into the forest, you have to walk a little bit and... well, we only heard it, we haven‘t seen it yet, right Tsukki? "

"Mhm? Yes."

"Woah!" Hana put her hands together and looked at you, "can we go there later?"  
You laughed at the sight.

"Sure," you said.

"Do you want to come with us? Later, maybe before dinner, before it gets dark?” Hana asked the two of them, but it was obvious that the question was mostly for Tsukishima, whom she almost asked for permission.  
Hana's puppy eyes were not enough; Yamaguchi, too, now looked at the blond boy with large, pleading eyes.

"Uh ... yeah, okay." He seemed a little confused - and honestly a little puzzled. Perhaps also astonished at himself that he had give in so easily.

_**▪︎ ♧ ▪︎** _

"You can cross almost all of these plants off the list," said Bobata, scratching his chin thoughtfully.  
He and Terushima stood in the greenhouse, where they had already spent half the morning in. It was huge and the back part hid a small oasis for succulents and various other plant species that bloomed in the spring. Even small bonsai trees were found there.  
Perhaps they also enjoyed the female company, since the four girls hardly left their side and preferred to stay in the warm greenhouse rather than outside.

The small group of six people who had settled there was playing an occasional cat and mouse game - maybe without really noticing.  
They stole looks, walked around, and pretended to accidentally bump into the opposite sex, as if the touch that occurred when Terushima picked up a pot and one of the girls touched his arm was an accident.

Any other day he and Bobata would have been happy with this, but that day in the greenhouse he couldn't convince himself to feel good about all that attention.  
It was still a better company than being outside with the others. Most of all, he appreciated the fact that he could avoid you here.  
After the Bokuto thing, Terushima was a thorn in Iwaizumi's eyes, but he wouldn't be the cocky Volleyballplayer, if he let that bother him too much. After all, his own fun and pleasure was still the most important, no matter what the impact or the consequences would be.

"Terushima-kun," it came suddenly from Hoshino, who had stood behind him shyly.  
Bobata also looked up and smiled wryly at his friend.

"Yes?" He asked, turning to her.

"Usually you're not this reserved ... did we do something wrong?"  
The other three girls hid behind her and peered innocently at him.  
He looked at her in surprise.

"Oh!" She stammered suddenly. "I didn't mean to call you out or anything!"  
She waved her arms wildly, now unsettled by the expression on his face.  
He started laughing as if he had heard the most entertaining joke. Then he raised his hand and stroked the top of her head.

"No, you didn't do anything," he assured her, "I guess I just wasn't quite me. You are sweet."  
Hoshino started to beam and Bobata rolled his eyes with a knowing smile on his face.  
Shinozaki took the chance, linked her arm with Minami‘s and pulled her forward.

"Come on, ask him," she whispered to her.  
She swallowed nervously, gathered all her courage and nodded.

"Terushima-kun!" Minami shouted loudly, "I ... uh ... I wanted to ask you, if you ... well, because you hang out with him so often ... well ... if Oikawa has a girlfriend ... "  
Your name fell right after, rolled over Shinozaki's lips, and spread across the greenhouse. She had spit it out with such a sour undertone that Terushima's shoulders tightened. His smile disappeared from his face as he fixated on the brunette.  
Hoshino seemed to notice the change on his face and pushed elbow into her friends side.

"What?" Shinozaki whispered annoyed. "It‘s true. She‘s everywhere."

Terushima had an uncomfortable feeling in his stomach and wanted to answer snappily, but he shook off all these thoughts. The game was still on and he was still out to win it.

"Nah," he said, smiling again, "he‘s got no girlfriend ... I take it, you're interested?"

His brisk manner made Minami blush and she looked down.

"But he's interested in someone else, isn't he?"  
She pouted noticeably, thought back to you and the many rumors that involved you and the seven boys. Who could even still see through that mess?   
In any case, Terushima seemed to want to take this opportunity. It came at the most perfect time. With a little luck, there could be one player less, soon.

"No, no," he said quickly, "I actually think you would be his type!"

"Oh my god, did you hear that, Minami?" Tokiwa asked, but Minami was petrified.

"And why is he always running after ... that girl?" Shinozaki pointed towards the door, a clear sign that she meant you.  
Terushima was relieved that she hadn't said your name again ... hadn‘t said it with such disgust, because he really didn't know what he would have done, if she had dared to tarnish your name once more. His fingertips started to tingle.  
But he had to push you in front of the bus, otherwise they wouldn't believe him.

"It's the other way around," he assured, and Minami's face lit up.

"See, the other girls were right," Shinozaki said, patting her friend‘s back. "She's just so desperate that she runs after every cute boy."

Terushima‘s head cocked up and he stared at Shinozaki. His eyes threatened to burst into the already infamous yellow that only you knew.  
He wasn't usually the one who was easily angered, but the brown-haired girl in front of him seemed to be able to pull an anger out of him that he otherwise didn't feel. Not even when Iwaizumi yelled at him or threatened to knock him out.

But as he stood there, recognizing the disgust in her eyes, he found that his hands were clenched into fists.

"Keep her out of this, okay?" He said now. Originally planned not to talk about you and make the rumors worse, but it had to be said.

"W-What?" Hoshino asked uncertainly when she noticed his piercing look that had fixed Shinozaki.  
Even though he stared at her so intensely, his tone had been cool and calculated. It was strange to see the otherwise relaxed and happy Terushima this way.

"If Minami is so interested in Oikawa, I'll keep my fingers crossed for her, honestly. You have good cards, but let other people out of this. It's not polite to act out of jealousy. ”  
His eyes grew even sharper, as if he was out to drive Shinozaki away, who flinched and swallowed hard.

**_▪︎ ♧ ▪︎_ **

  
Half an hour passed before you and Hana could tell the last student that they were allowed to do other things until dinner.  
Most hadn't needed to hear that twice.  
Hana and you tried to clean up the mess around you; you stacked the empty boxes on top of each other again so that you could use them tomorrow and the empty sacks that once carried the soil that you used for the many pots were all put in one place for later disposal.  
Fortunately, Akaashi came to your aid and the three of you soon came to the end.  
When you were just sorting the lists and counting the plants, Bokuto came to you, who - again - was holding a plant in his hands without any protective gloves.  
Akaashi helped Hana with a half-full sack of dirt that the two of them wanted to put aside, but couldn't help but look up at Bokuto, whose face had a big grin on.

"Okay," he said as he came to a stop in front of you, "this time ... I have something."  
You looked at him in amazement and inspected the leaves of the plant.  
Hana and Akaashi joined you and you could already see in Hana's face that she was thinking the same thing.

"It's ... the same plant as before," you said, looking at him apologetically. There was something about his smile that was so genuine that made it all the more difficult to disappoint him.

"This is a nettle plant, just not fully grown," added Hana.  
"I'll get the ointment ..." said Akaashi and was already gone.  
You handed the lists over to Hana and took a step towards Bokuto, whose good mood was still unshaken.

"Please use your gloves next time, alright?", You carefully took the plant off his eyes and saw his red hands, which reacted faster to the plant than they did to you. "You got some cuts."  
You pointed to a small cut that started on his thumb and ended shortly before his index finger. It was almost a scratch, but in connection with his sensitive skin and the nettle plant that had just been on it, you wanted to be on the safe side and look at it carefully.

"You should wash that out later when we are in the house," you said, and when you looked up to look into his eyes, your breath hitched.   
His eyes glittered slightly as if they were about to tear up. His smile was gone. Instead, there was an indefinable expression on his face that was trying to pull you under a spell.  
When Akaashi came back, you backed away and gave him the space to take care of his clumsy friend.  
While you let the black-haired male do his deed as a good friend, you looked around.

Terushima had approached Hinata not far from you, put his arm around his shoulders and pulled him towards him.  
You almost looked away when you noticed that they were looking at you.  
Hinata at least tried not to look so obvious and tried to escape the taller male, who just kept pulling him. And he seemed to be saying something that made Hinata recoil with embarrassment. He seemed to be stammering and you frowned. He seemed to be concocting something?

And you weren't the only one who thought that, because while you were completely distracted by Terushima and Hinata, you didn't notice Iwaizumi's eyes still burning on you as if he could finally figure out why you were so different than all of their past victims.  
He also noticed how strange Terushima acted. He followed your gaze, which led him to Terushima and Hinata.

"Hey," he said, his facade crumbling for the first time this morning.  
His brown-haired friend did not seem to hear him. He took his time to select flowers to give them to Minami, while acting unnecessarily cute.  
Her cheeks were red the whole time and she looked at Oikawa with a look, Iwaizumi would have preferred to avoid.  
She and Shinozaki had come out of the greenhouse at the same time that Terushima had left, and had been sticking to Oikawa's side for the last ten minutes, who didn‘t seem to mind.

"Idiot!" Iwaizumi called loudly and was about to kick Oikawa, when he already turned and looked at Iwaizumi in surprise. Then a smile spread across his face.

"I know that it's hard for you to get attention from girls, Iwa-chan ~", he paused for a moment and gave the flower in his hand to Shinozaki, who started to giggle - "but that‘s not my fault!"  
Then came the kick that he had just been spared.  
Iwaizumi had kicked him in the butt, causing Oikawa to lose his balance and jump forward.

"Ouch!" Said the brown-haired male with a grumpy expression on his face, "that really wasn't necessary, I-"  
He fell silent when he looked at Iwaizumis eyes - wide with rage.  
"While you're goofing around here," Iwaizumi spoke, but didn't say what he'd observed. He didn't want Minami and Shinozaki to notice anything. So he grabbed Oikawa's upper arm and pulled him towards him.  
He positioned him exactly in a way, that he looked directly to Terushima and Hinata.

"They're being strange today," Kunimi whispered to Kindaichi a few meters away.

"Stranger than usual, you mean?" He asked, following Kunimi's gaze to look at the older students.

"Your eyes," Oikawa said suddenly, pointing to Iwaizumi.  
Iwaizumi immediately looked down and blinked a few times.  
When he looked up again, convinced that it was nothing, he saw Oikawa's eyes glowing.

"Mine? Your eyes!"  
Oikawa did the same, lowered his head and quickly rubbed his eyes as if that was going to fix it.

"They are ... clearly stranger than usual," commented Kunimi.

"Everything okay with you guys?", The question came from Kindaichi, who had taken a step in their direction.

Not a second later, Oikawa had raised his hand to keep him away - eyes shut tightly.

"Everything's fine!" He assured him.

Kindaichi flinched.

"You sure? I can get you some water-"

"That was a grain of sand or something," said Iwaizumi, "we‘re okay, thanks"

"You are acting really strange," Kunimi said now and also took a step forward.

"W-What?" Oikawa, who peeked briefly through half-closed eyes, saw the two approaching. "We only have something in our eyes, okay?!"

"Eye check!", Iwaizumi whirled Oikawa around and only let go of him when he thought they were standing in front of each other.

"I'm going into the house," Kunimi murmured to Kindaichi, who clung to him and preferred to follow, instead of staying with Iwaizumi and Oikawa any longer.

"Your eyes look alright," he heard Iwaizumi say.

"Yes, yours do too," Oikawa had replied and then Kunimi and Kindaichi were already so far that they could no longer hear them.

"It's getting ... a little too..." Iwaizumi started. A tension hung between them, that gave even Minami and Shinozaki goosebumps.

"... dangerous," Oikawa finished his sentence. There was something almost friendly about it, but the stinging look in both eyes proved the contrary.

Their posture took on something defensive, as if the moment had just brought the reality of their situation back.  
It was clear to both that Terushima was planning something, maybe even something harmless, but the game had not been forgotten.  
Oikawa's arms fell to his side and the tense shoulders showed Iwaizumi that even the brown-haired sinner understood the seriousness of the situation.  
An unspoken fight and the already known competition, which always lurked in their souls, spread into them again.  
The two friends were about to suffocate. Between them was your unspoken name that floated through the air like a distant melody and anchored itself in every breeze.

"We have to act," Iwaizumi said, whose serious expression would send a shiver down every spectator's back. Minami trembled slightly.

"May the better one win," added Oikawa, and the icy undertone not only seemed to reach the two girls, but also made the wind around them a little colder.

**_▪︎ ♧ ▪︎_ **

  
Hana and you had been back in the house for fifteen minutes now, spending the last five minutes washing your hands thoroughly. You were sure that the others also had dirty hands, but since you had filled various pots and moved boxes, the water simply did not want to turn white.  
You were already scrubbing your hands and it started to hurt, but you stood over the small sink on the upper floor, talked about the day and laughed while the water ran into your hands and was still dripping down brown.

"Poor Bokuto," Hana spoke.  
She took a little more soap.  
You nodded

"The ointment helped a little, but they were still red," she added, thinking briefly about it, still rubbing her hands together to make the soap foam.  
You looked down at your own hands.  
You had taken the plant from him, and even though they were burning a bit, even now, they were neither red nor had any unpleasant pustules.  
You felt sorry for him, you still did, but you had to think back to the day in that room, when he was sitting next to you, getting closer and closer, until...  
You had to think of the wound that looked bad enough the day after, that you had to cover your neck again and you couldn't get rid of the confusion of feelings that was triggered within you when you had looked at the bite mark more closely.

Bokuto was cute. He was tall, muscular, and had broad shoulders, quite a contrast to many other students and players.  
He had smelled good, his skin had been warm and it just felt right to sit next to him.   
But that hadn‘t been Bokuto.

You started to differentiate all of this well enough. Especially after you saw that he had somehow struggled and fought his way through - the real Bokuto had broken out for a few seconds to apologize to you. And you didn't know what Satori had done to him, but something had changed since he and Kuroo have had that malfunction.

There was pressure on the group and on you, and yet ... everything felt more natural today than it ever had.  
The mood was good, the boys were more themselves and you ... you seemed to be yourself, too.  
You were afraid of the next change; too afraid that they would lose control and become less themselves again.

"I think your hands are clean now," you heard Hana say and looked up. You had been so deep in thought that you hadn't noticed how you continued to scrub and wash. Your hands now felt uncomfortably warm and throbbed very lightly.

"I'm sorry," you said, turning the water off.  
For a brief moment there was a silence that tried to flood over you, but Hana was your rock in the surf, because she just smiled warmly at you, handed you one of the towels hanging behind you and shook her head.

"You did really well today," she said, trying to convince you, "even with the circumstances right now ... you know ... I guess I don't quite understand what's going on here, maybe I never will, but -"  
Hana left the sentence hanging in the air, thinking about how to say what was on her mind.  
She turned away from the sink - the small bathroom too tiny to move much. Her hand found the low-hanging shelf that hung on the wall behind you and she gently stroked some glass figures that looked more ancient than they might have been.

You looked at her, focused your eyes on her for the first time in a long time.  
A worry had spread across her face that you couldn't place exactly, but her eyes were gentle and her eyebrows were drawn together, which you wouldn't be able to tell if you didn't bother focusing on her.  
The hair clips, which she only had on one side, were light pink, light blue and light yellow and went down in a zigzag pattern, where her bangs were now too long and tucked neatly behind her ear.

"... Of course I don't know what kind of relationship you have with the boys ... not that I am saying you have any kind of relationship, oh, you know what I mean, right? We are just always together and I see that they are giving you a hard time and I cannot help you, but I am glad that we are doing more together again. I think I just never noticed how similar we are and how natural everything is with you. You have become my best friend and I am just so proud of you that you don't let anything bring you down and we still stand here and have done a good job out there, although I know that you would have loved to be anywhere else and -"  
You looked at Hana with big eyes and she didn't talk anymore, but looked at you uncertainly. You were shocked.

"Hana!" You cried out. "Hana! I thank you. Really. Thank you for all of this, thank you for always being there, even when I don't know that I need you. You have also become my best friend and I couldn't imagine anyone more benevolent or understanding than you. It all sounds so cheesy, but thank you."

When did that even happen?

Tears threatened to leak out of your eyes and you couldn‘t remember any other moment in your life, when you felt as welcome and accepted as in this one with Hana.  
You had never been able to call anyone your best friend, maybe Hana's words hit you all the harder since she said it first.  
You were best friends and you shared a connection that surprised both of you.

Hana threw her arms around your neck and pressed against you. She was smaller than you, but you did the same and hugged her back and for a few minutes the world seemed so incredibly human and perfect, as if all the demons out there no longer existed.

And as if all worries were forgotten, you two laughed. Very quietly at first.  
Hana had her head buried in your shoulder and giggled softly against it as you did the same.  
Less than five seconds later, you let yourself go, looked at each other, and started snorting.

"That was weird," she said, and her face had taken on a reddish tone from laughing so much. That happened to her quite often.

"That was ... definitely funny, but honestly I'm glad that I have you," you said and before you could finally escape from the way too small bathroom, she playfully slapped you on the arm and smiled at you.

When you were back in the hallway, you saw someone fidgeting near the stairs. A few steps later you recognized the brown, tousled hair.  
Yamaguchi stood at the stairs and hardly dared to come closer. A small glimmer of red glittered on his cheeks and when he saw you he seemed relieved.

"T-There you are!" He called out, waving to you. "I didn't want to ... run around here without being asked to ... I've been looking for you, we want to explore the creek, we heard earlier."  
He gave you a big smile, but the red on his face didn't go away.

"Ah, sorry," you said, feeling a little guilty that you had kept him waiting. “We washed our hands, but we would love to join you now. Thanks for the invitation!"

"I can’t wait," Hana added, pulling on your arm to run down the stairs. "Come on. The last one that arrives downstairs has to fill up the plate for the other two later”  
And as soon as she said that, she had already stormed down and left you and Yamaguchi up there. You had to briefly repeat her words in your mind, before you exchanged a knowing expression with Yamaguchi and followed suit.  
By pulling you forward before going down, you had a safe lead, but Yamaguchi - a little careful that he didn't bump into you - didn't seem to want to lose.  
With only a half foot ahead, you were the second to arrive on the ground floor and whirled around to look at Yamaguchi.  
Hana clapped for you and you raised your arm so she could high-five you.

"I think this means ..." Hana pushed past you to examine Yamaguchi. "... that you make us a nice plate tonight!"  
The brown-haired Server folded his arms over his chest and took turns looking at Hana and you. Then he laughed and shrugged.

"There you are," said Tsukishima, who was watching you with a bad mood. "Took you guys quite long ..."  
He had said the last part more softly, but you heard it.  
Yamaguchi ran to the front, to his blonde friend who was already walking ahead and you heard him apologize.

"Grumpy guy," Hana whispered to you and you nodded.  
Together you went through the back entrance to shorten your way.  
You walked past the filled boxes that you and Hana had left there and turned west to continue towards the greenhouse.  
After all Yamaguchi had heard the stream in the forest behind the house.  
So you just followed along.

You took in the sunrays, that struggled through the leaves despite the mild cold. The grass became wilder at the beginning of the forest. You found a place where the bushes grew less feral. You passed through there and were now in the forest that you and Hana had been curious about for half the day.

"Watch out, it's pretty overgrown over there and it's hard to walk through. Behind all of those bushes is a small clearing and if we walk a little further, we should find the creek!"  
Yamaguchi had turned to you and pointed his finger at the area that could cause you problems.  
Tsukishima was the perfect example of how you could walk carefully through the overgrown grass without a scratch, so you quickly copied him, while Yamaguchi tried to push some hanging branches out of your way.

"Thank you," you said when you were second to come out of the thicket and almost ran into Tsukishimas back.  
Yamaguchi stayed behind to get Hana safely to the other side and followed after her.  
She also thanked him and when you were finally four again, you turned to Tsukishima, who stood before. His body frozen in place.  
Only now did you notice the many sounds around you and also recognize the reason for Tsukishima's strange behavior.

There was a large clearing in front of you. The grass was short, hardly a plant that stuck out of the ground seemed to grow here and the many trees around you seemed to respect the clearing so much, that they stood in a circle around them.

But your attention was occupied by the many students in front of you.  
You were sure that almost all of them were here and you didn't have to count to assume that the only ones missing were Mukai and the four girls.

A rope had been stretched out and tied to opposite trees in the middle of the clearing. It divided the large square in two and you saw Bobata and Hinata set up water bottles to use as markings.  
It looked like a huge, selfmade volleyball court and you were ... impressed.

Bokuto had a volleyball tucked under his arm while he was talking to Kuroo and pointing to the rope and you honestly wondered where they got that ball from, or the idea for all of this.

"Oh look," Lev called out, pointing to the four of you who had just joined in.

"Whaaaat!? Do you want to play, too? You came at the most perfect time,” Kuroo waved you four over and you already noticed from Tsukishima's bored posture that he was about to go back into the house.  
Maybe he would just crouch next to Kunimi and Kenma and look as disinterested as those two.

"Or ... are you afraid?" Kuroo's provocative tone seemed to work. “I mean, we already have really strong players here. Maybe that's not for you?"  
His proud grin was just the highlight and Tsukishima seemed annoyed enough to join. He had long been out of the act of pretending that volleyball wasn't a passion in his life, but he wanted to get away from everything stressful for two days ... yet ... while he was looking at Kuroo, his fingertips seemed to tingle.

"We're playing," he announced, pulling Yamaguchi along with him.  
Hana and you stayed there a little lost and looked at each other.  
Your communication also seemed to work without saying a word, because she was looking at you with an insecure look and your eyes rolled towards the forest as if suggesting you could just leave.

"Hey, hey, hey!" Kuroo suddenly called. "Don't you want to play, as well? Bokuto has to sit this one out, anyway."

"This will be exciting," said Oikawa and smiled at you. "You should join!"

"We?" You asked. You didn't expect an answer, but you got one anyway.

"Yes!", Hinata looked at you excitedly. "Come on! This is going to be fun! Have you ever played volleyball?"  
Hana shook her head.

"It's quite easy! The ball goes SWOOOSH and you go BAMMM, then you throw it over the net and make a point ... or you don't!"  
You scratched your head in despair and looked over at Hana, whose face showed a panic that alarmed you.

"I ... I'm afraid of balls, I can't," she whispered to you.

"Yeah, no problem, let's just go back and help with dinner", you wanted to take her arm to link it with yours, but someone had already sneaked behind you and put one arm over your shoulders.  
You were pulled into someone's chest and you were horrified to find out that it was Terushima who had such a big grin on his face that you were able to spot the piercing on his tongue.

"Don't look so sad, come on, we'll play a little," he said, pulling you and Hana to the others.

"H-Hey, you can't just drag them with you like that," Kindaichi said, who surprisingly came to your aid immediately, followed by Goshiki, whose mouth hung wide open.

"Let her go," he ordered and trotted after you, like a young prince who wanted to help but didn't really know how.

"Terushima, you're a wolf," said Semi, who watched with his arms crossed and then shook his head.  
He let go of Hana, who eyed him with an annoyed expression on her face. His arm was still wrapped around you and you avoided eye contact with him or Hana. You didn't want her to get trouble just by defending you and you didn't want to see his smug face.

His hand stroked almost too casually along your upper arm and you turned your head to him with a warning expression.  
You looked him in the face as you slapped his hand away, and it barely gave you the satisfaction you would have expected. He just laughed at you, so you shook your head and Hana followed you like a shadow.  
With her in tow, you went to Kenma and Kunimi, who were still crouched down.

"Oh come on," Terushima said and came up to you four with his hands raised, acting innocent.

"'S fine," you said, fake smiling at him in return, "we're gonna play."

"W-What?!" it came from Hana's direction. "We are?"

"Hell. Yeah. We are," you replied, already imagining how you could throw the ball at Terushima's head - several times if possible.

**_▪︎ ♧ ▪︎_ **

  
Hana and you had sat next to Kenma and Kunimi, who explained the rules and advised you what to look out for. They were good at explaining, not like Hinata, who had jumped into the conversation from time to time and had been saying confusing things. You hadn't found it bad - he was quite entertaining - but it seemed to confuse Hana in particular.

"How often do you get hit in the head?" She asked worriedly.

"Shouldn't really happen if you keep your eyes open," Kunimi said and the orange hair of Hinata was already coming into your view.

"Well, I get hit a lot," he said, barely pouting when he thought back to the last time, which wasn't so long ago.  
He noticed Hana's panicked expression and immediately waved his hands around.

"No, no, it's my fault! It's because I'm not careful," he scratched his head again thoughtfully, "Tsukishima always makes fun of me"

"Yes, because it shows on your face when you daydream instead of focusing. So it's not surprising that you get hit so often.” Tsukishima had said, as if he was waiting for a moment to disregard any of Hinata's words.  
Hinata looked at him angrily, his mouth close to foaming.

"Okay, so when do you rotate again?" Hana asked.  
She was a little more confident than a few minutes ago, but the many rules still seemed to confuse her.

"If it's our side's turn, we rotate before playing," explained Kunimi, who looked tiny from his sitting position.  
Kuroo had joined in to continue explaining.

"We will play it a little differently. The rules of beach volleyball apply today. We also take turns because we are so many. That means if you are on the outside position and we have to rotate, you go out and someone else comes into the field. And then you wait until it's your turn again."  
Kuroo looked at Hana, as if he could convince her that it didn't sound too bad.

"Don't forget that a block here already counts as first touch!" You heard Oikawa say, who quickly pointed to Kunimi and then to Kindaichi.  
Kunimi rolled his eyes. He wasn't a blocker anyway, but he was sure Oikawa mentioned it because he still saw himself as his teacher, even years later.

"Isn't that even more difficult..." you muttered to yourself.

"How about..." Hana said, who stuck to your side again and was already afraid to clash with any of the giants here, "we only one round."

"You know what," you replied with a nod, "that sounds like a great idea."

"How do we put the teams together?" Lev asked.

"The good old way," Kuroo replied.

"We are lining up in a row," added Oikawa. "Bokuto is counting."  
You were surprised that Bokuto had to sit out and looked over to him. He had a sad expression on his face and even his hair, which was otherwise pointing upwards, had lost some of it's wild spikey look, as if they confirmed and reflected his mood.

He still had the ball tucked under his arm and was now trudging towards you.  
Before he got to you, you squeezed in between Yamaguchi and Kunimi so as not to stand right next to Hana. You heard Kuroo. The teams wouldn't be set in stone but you would like to be in a team with Hana, since you would only be here for one round.

Bokuto stopped in front of Hana and sighed.

You tried to steal a look at his hands, but he pressed them flat against his waist. You were convinced that they still hurt.  
You would have loved to reach out for him and put your hands in his. You remembered his blissful expression back when you touched his palms and you shook briefly to get rid of your confused thoughts.

Maybe it was his incredibly sad expression that struck you that way, but in this moment it was really just Bokuto standing there. Not a being that tormented not only you, but also him. You almost forgot what he had looked like when he had gotten close to you in the common room.

Right now it was only Bokuto, who was sad that he couldn't play.  
Only Bokuto, who was otherwise part of every game and shone brightly when playing, like a sunflower under the sun.

As if you were thinking outloud, his head turned to you as if he had heard every word. He looked at you for a split second, then turned back to Hana.  
You were certain that he had felt your staring, but it made a shiver run down your spine.

" _One, two, one, two...,_ " he started counting.

**_▪︎ ♧ ▪︎_ **

  
It took a while for everyone to stand on their assigned side and it took another while for everyone to decide which side was starting.  
After Bokuto counted off and you managed to be in a team with Hana, the boys decided to send both of you to the side, where you would have to wait for the keyword. That came in handy because you could watch them play, before joining in. You noticed that it no longer mattered which team you were originally divided into, since everyone jumped to the field, whenever a rotation took place.

The first few rounds flew by and Hana pulled on your arm, every time someone scored a particularly strong point and the ball bounced off the grass and flew towards you.  
So far you had stopped four balls from hitting you. Hana looked on edge.

It was soon your turn to jump in, as Semi came towards the spectator side and high-fived you, while they were rotating and you now had to move to the back of the field. The server position.  
The ball was handed to you before you even reached the water-bottle-mark and you took it - albeit with shaky hands.

Everyone was staring at you, literally everyone.  
The ball in your hands felt incredibly heavy and you swallowed hard.  
They knew you weren't an ace in volleyball. They would forgive you, if you didn't hit the ball over the rope, would they?

You stood behind the mark, which was hardly a line anymore. Between the bottles of water, that stood in every corner of the field to know where the field started and ended, there had been leaves, half of which had already flown away.  
You had watched them often enough to know how a serve looked and you had done them yourself just as often when you practiced volleyball in high school for a few weeks. At least one thing you were reasonably good at back then.  
After all, you weren't the smallest, nor the weakest, so if you used the technique correctly, you should be able to get the ball to the other side.

You crouched slightly and held the ball in your left hand, throwing it up immediately and hitting it so hard with your right hand.  
It flew over the rope quite quickly and you hardly had time to rejoice because the other side was already reacting.

"Great serve!" You heard Yaku, who was on your side of the field. He gave you a thumbs up.

Goshiki, who was also on your side, called you back to the field and you obeyed quickly.  
The ball flew back and the players in front started to jump up to stop it.  
The other team was working with Hinata, which made it all the more difficult for your team. At the moment you only had Goshiki, Kunimi and Yaku in front of the _net._ They found it incredibly difficult to block - understandably so, since they were smaller in height, than the blockers on the other side.

Now that you were standing in the field, you noticed how different the mood was in here.  
You almost winced; the energetic atmosphere was electric, and even in a spontaneous game like this one, everyone took it so seriously that you had to, too.

A few more rounds passed, until you had rotated so far that Hana finally joined in. She had sat back in line before she finally dared to come out, and your side looked promising.  
You were at the front with this rotation, but you also had Terushima, Akaashi, Yamaguchi, Iwaizumi and Lev on your side.  
You watched Hana curiously as she walked with shaky legs to the mark, where you had felt just as nervous before.

Oikawa was on the other side of the net, calling for you to throw the ball to you. It would probably be better if the ball was thrown at her gently, especially if it came from you. You smiled gratefully at him and looked back at Hana.  
She stood there with an anxious expression.

"You can do it," you said and she nodded. She was shaking a little, when you threw the ball into her direction.  
You had thrown correctly, not too low, not too high and not too hard, but her panic made her freeze in place. The ball bounced off her forearms and rolled over to Terushima, who was standing next to you.  
Behind you was Iwaizumi, whom you skilfully ignored, but even now you felt his eyes on you.

Terushima picked up the ball and tried to throw it back to Hana, but he paused when he saw her startled expression. Now she seemed even more nervous than before. Her mouth was hanging wide open and her eyes were big. You were almost afraid that her soul was about to leave her body.  
You reached out slightly for her even though you were standing so far away.

"H-Hana ... everything okay?" You asked.  
Instead of an answer, she just hung her head down.

Without leaving his position, Terushima did something extremely nice.  
He threw the ball to Bobata, who was sitting on the grass waiting for another rotation.

"Hey, Bobata, show her how to do it," he said, then looked at Hana, who jumped like a scared cat and looked at Terushima. "Don't worry! You can do it!"

Bobata got up and winked at his friend.

"Just leave that to me," he said with an affirmative undertone and ran towards Hana, who almost jumped out of her skin when he got to her.  
Hinata and Goshiki stood up as well and although they were about to switch in, they jumped up to cheer on Hana.

With the ball in his hands, he showed her how to properly serve. Nobody seemed to have any objection or say anything because they took their time and you had to smile while watching Hana. She was looking up again, watching Bobata intently.  
When she mimicked his posture perfectly, he gave her the ball and she felt confident enough to do it.

She apparently wanted it over as quickly as possible, so she threw the ball into the air without any sort of warning and threw it so fast, one might think it was on fire.  
Your entire team blinked once and then followed the ball to see if it made it to the other side. You didn't know if this surprise effect was tactical, but while thinking about it, you almost missed the ball touching the top of the rope, then rolling onto the opposing field.

"Woah!" Hinata shouted, shocked and impressed at the same time.  
That was a point!

"Oh no," muttered Hana, "I'm sorry, it touched the rope. That's bad, isn't it?"

"What do you mean?" Terushima wanted to know and turned to her, his eyes wide. "That was perfect! You scored a point for us!"

"Good job, Hana," Lev said next to her and Bobata touched his chest dramatically emotional.

"I couldn't have taught her any better," he said.

"Beginner's luck," Kuroo whispered on the other side. He hadn't expected the game to be so much more exciting with you two in it.

"You can do it again," Terushima called to Hana and took the ball from Kuroo to throw it at her feet.  
This time, with more self-confidence, Hana caught the ball before it landed on the floor and again imitated Bobata's posture, who couldn't look any prouder.

Once again, she delivered a top performance, but the trees that were around you and the branches, which sometimes hung too low, stopped another point.  
You were sure the ball would have easily got to the other side, but Hana had thrown it up so far that it got stuck between two branches.

"My mistake," she said immediately.  
It was stuck so high up, that many leaves around it blocked most of the view. Some were already moving to get closer to the tree and you copied them by going over to Hana and then gathering together under the tree.

"Oh wow," said Hinata, pointing up, "it's pretty high up there."

"I'm really sorry," Hana stammered, and you patted her shoulder.

"Oh, don't worry" - Akaashi stepped next to you - "That would have happened sooner or later anyway. I was already awaiting that outcome."

"You really have quite a talent for the server position, _Goda-chan_ ," commented Oikawa, who appeared next to you with his arms casually on his waist.

"Ah, thanks," she replied - clearly tense and embarrassed. Oikawa and Hana usually got along fine, but even exchanging small talk with him, had been weird for her lately.

"Who's going to get the ball down now?" Lev asked into the group, but instead of answering him, everyone just looked at him. After all, he was the tallest here.  
When he noticed the silence that had befallen them all, he drew in a sharp breath.

"Me?!", he wanted to know and pointed at himself with his index finger.

"You won earlier," said Hinata, thinking back to the branch Lev had easily touched.

"Yes, exactly," Kenma spoke, "you said so. So you should get the ball. "  
A mischievous smile spread across Lev's face and his eyes narrowed.

"No problem," he said, and if you had blinked, you would have missed how he had already climbed the first branch with a jump, agile, like a cat, before reaching the next branch without losing his balance.

"Be careful!" Yaku warned and Kuroo watched the gray-haired male critically - one hand on his hip and the other hanging by his side.

Lev just had to climb one more branch until he could touch the ball without having to go up any further. He stretched out his long arm and poked it. Your heart pounded in your chest and your hands clenched into fists with nervousness.

You were afraid for him.

Especially when he tried to stretch himself even more to get the ball down and you just thought of Professor Furuya, who might have a heart attack if he saw any of this.

And then the ball rolled down and Lev quickly crouched to regain his balance.  
You took a deep breath of relief and while half of the boys chased the ball, the other half waited for Lev, to make sure he came down unscathed.

You stood there, waiting for him.

When he reached the lowest branch, he jumped down and landed on the grass in front of you. You got startled, but smiled happily at him. He gave you a crooked smile in response and Kuroo signaled to him to step back into position so you could continue playing.

Back in the field you rotated once, because it was considered a point for the others. The next rotation would force you to switch spots with someone from the spectator side.

The other side had the ball now and unfortunately it was Oikawa's turn.  
You had to block with Iwaizumi, who was already preparing to stop Oikawa's killer serve. If there was one person who could do it, it probably was him, because he knew Oikawa so well ... but _you_ were scared.  
Oikawa's expression didn't sit well with you. He had looked at you and Iwaizumi as if he was planning something and you swallowed hard, while watching him.

"When I say jump, you jump, understood?" Iwaizumi said next to you and although he stared straight ahead, you knew that you were meant. There was no room for objection, no time to say yes, because Oikawa had gotten ready by closing his eyes.

He was highly concentrated and seeing him from this angle, from the other side of the field, was a new kind of discovery that triggered goosebumps on your skin.

He threw the ball up with such a strange elegance that you would not have expected in this sport. But that passed quickly, because when he hit the ball, he hit it with such force that the sound echoed.

The ball came down onto your field so fast, that you only felt the breeze of it.  
A surprised squeak escaped you and you thought Iwaizumi’s anger would soon meet you because you hadn’t jumped, but quickly realized that his cue had never come.  
When you looked over to him, you saw why. He was petrified in his position, like everyone else on your side.

"You idiot!" He suddenly shouted. "That was intentional."  
You didn't exactly know what he meant, but Oikawa shrugged and looked at him with innocent eyes.

"I haven't done these kind of serves in a long time," Oikawa said, and the concentration on his face scared you. "This is really fun!"

"Wow, that was ...", Lev behind you had trouble describing what just happened.

"He aimed exactly between the two of you," confirmed Akaashi Iwaizumi's accusation, which he hadn't said outloud.  
Terushima was already switched out and Bobata was in now.. Yamaguchi behind you exuded a strangely grumpy mood that you felt on your back as if it were meant for you, but you knew it wasn't.

Oikawa was allowed to do it again.

Again highly concentrated and confident, he was getting ready. Before throwing the ball up this time, he briefly looked at you and then everything went by too fast.

You still saw him jump up to serve and hit the ball. It came towards you at a tremendous pace. You were about to jump, thinking that maybe somehow you would be ablte to stop him, but someone's grip on your arm prevented you from doing so.  
You were pulled and then pushed in another direction until you noticed that it was Iwaizumi, who changed positions with you. He had jumped up to stop the ball, but it came with such force that Iwaizumi barely had time to do it. The ball crashed into his side while he was in midair and he groaned painfully.  
That was good enough for Akaashi to accept the ball and set it to Bobata.

You were amazed at how quickly Iwaizumi regained his composure, because the moment he got back on the floor, he turned to make sure the ball was still in the air.  
They played it over the rope and even though it got over a little weakly, you still managed to score a point.

You felt guilty. Did he pull you out of the way because you were just _that_ bad? Did he think, you would have refused to jump? You felt defeated and insecure.

"Don't make that face," Iwaizumi suddenly said and you looked up in surprise, "he purposely threw it in your direction. You couldn't have gotten it to stop. He wanted it to hit you because he's an idiot."  
When you looked at Iwaizumi, he looked back at Oikawa, who was about to ask one of his teammates what kind of balls he liked to hit most.

"Oi!", Iwaizumi's loud voice came unexpectedly, but this time you didn't get startled, "Stupidkawa! What kind of idiot throws at a girl?"

"What? What is that accusation, _Iwa-chan_ ," he replied," I just did my serves, as usual. "

"Idiot," the black-haired male grumbled next to you before you left the field and high-fived Goshiki, so he could switch with you.

_**▪︎ ♧ ▪︎** _

  
"That was fun" - Hana linked her arms with yours again, as usual, and you went back to the house together while listening to her talk about the game - "I can't believe the ball got stuck in a tree two more times. Poor Lev will be so tired later ... and have you seen Goshiki? He's kind of cute, how he blushes if we just look in his direction."  
She paused for a moment.

"Satori guessed almost every ball! He and Tsukishima in the same team would be invincible. In the last two rounds we didn't even have a chance, it was so weird. They're all really good, what do you think?"  
Her eyes searched for yours to know what you thought of. You looked at her and thought for a moment.

"That's right," you said, "I heard that Satori used to be really feared in games because he always somehow guessed the hits right."

"That is impressive," she said.

Since it was getting late, it was getting colder and colder, which is why the cool afternoon air became harsher.  
Even though the sky was still clear, the older host of the house only needed to stand outside for a mere minute, to confirm his assumption: He said it would rain soon, so you would have to eat dinner in the house.  
The food had been cooked and grilled outside and then carried inside.

They had pushed open the Shoji doors so that carrying it in, wouldn't take too much time and you could still enjoy the view of the nightsky.

It would have been nice to eat under the sky where the first stars could already be seen. 

_**▪︎ ♧ ▪︎** _

A long table that now took up most of the living room. The fish pieces were now spread over several plates.  
The fresh vegetables, rice and various side dishes also decorated the table and it looked incredibly appetizing.  
The boys had arrived a few minutes after you and Hana, so the preparation didn't take long.

Throughout the whole dinner, your eyes kept wandering to the other corner.  
After all, you had spent the whole day with them and slowly you started to question whether they really were themselves today or just pulled off the most convincing act ever.  
When could you be sure that they weren't lying into everybody's faces?

Still, you watched them. Satori had separated from the rest of the group and was sitting with Semi and Goshiki. Iwaizumi and Oikawa, on the other hand, were sitting with Kunimi and Kindaichi, but the brown-haired male had sat down next to Kuroo, who always referred to him as "Oika'a-Kun". Kuroo had confiscated Kenmas Switch while eating and refused to return it until the smaller player finished eating.  
Bokuto and Akaashi were right next to them, and Lev, along with Yaku and Hinata, had sat down next to Akaashi. Terushima had followed Satori's example and sat far away. Together with Bobata, they were busy with the four girls again.  
Lev fell asleep almost every two seconds and you remembered, that Hinata had mentioned, that after you and Hana left, the ball flew into a tree a few more times. Lev had brought the ball down every time and together with the volleyball game and the hard work today, he was a complete mess now and could hardly wait to be in bed to sleep.

Later, when you were cleaning up, you thought about it, so you turned in hopes to find him among the others. You hadn't seen him in a while.  
The old man had been right, and when you were all just sitting down to start eating, it had started raining so hard that you were all amazed.  
He was now sitting in front of the open Shoji door, watching the rain and smiling happily to himself. His wife had moved upstairs with Professor Furuya and Nakano, where they were now moving pillows and blankets from the third floor to the second so that each of the boys was taken care of.

Akaashi was in the kitchen, where he wanted to do the dishes with the four girls. Mukai helped them and Goshiki had squeezed in there as well. There was a tower of dirty dishes, so the more helpers they had, the better.

Semi was just about to take the stack of plates from Hana, which she was trying to carry into the kitchen and Bokuto sprinted past you, with several bowls, perfectly balancing them on his hands.

With a frown, you looked around and recognized Hinata, who was crouched down and looked at the floor. When you got closer and some guys cleared the way, you saw what he was actually doing.

Lev was laying on his stomach. His face was just as flat on the floor and his long limbs pointed in almost every direction. Hinata tried nudging him awake.

"Is he dead?" He asked and looked up to find you standing there. Your equally shocked expression just increased his concern. "What do we do?!"

"Relax," you suddenly heard behind you, "after today, it's no wonder he's exhausted like that."

"We should at least carry him up," said Yaku, trying to lift Lev's left arm. It looked like he was trying to pick up a Titan.

"Yes, yes, later," Kuroo simply said and waved it off.

So everyone went back to cleaning up.  
You still felt sorry for him.

"Where's the broom, there are lots of crumbs here," you heard Iwaizumi ask, who looked around and tried to find out who had snatched the broom from under his nose.

Yamaguchi was in the process of sweeping something away and Tsukishima just stood by and watched. Satori was no different. He had gone somewhere where no one was looking for him, except Semi, who mentioned every two minutes how irresponsible it was that the redhead had just left. Kindaichi was just wiping the table and Kunimi _helped_ him by pointing to stains that Kindaichi had missed.  
Kenma had sat down next to Lev and was busy with his cell phone. Hinata watched intently as he played something, both ignoring the exhausted Lev next to them.

"Where's the dry cleaning rag?" Akaashi suddenly asked from the kitchen and Oikawa and Kuroo, who just had the rag, looked around.

"I just had it," Kuroo murmured.

"Maybe you dropped it when you went back?" Oikawa looked behind him and tried to find the rag on the floor.

"I would have noticed that," he replied.

You also looked around hoping to find it. In the whole mess nobody looked at Lev, who was still passed out in the same place and just when you thought you had to check on him, you also found the missing rag.  
Kuroo might have dropped it when he went back to the kitchen to bring some chopsticks back and hadn't noticed because it had never touched the floor.

The green cleaning cloth had fallen on Lev's head and you didn't know exactly how long it had been there, but it covered the gray-haired male's entire head.  
You pointed speechlessly at him and Kuroo, who was now following your finger, bent down to pick up the rag.

"Unwanted and a bit surprising, but really funny," he commented before his voice grew louder. "Found it!"

_**▪︎ ♧ ▪︎** _

  
When the last student found their bed, it was unusually quiet in the big house.  
It was four past ten and you stared at the ceiling.  
Taking a shower after eating had worked wonders for your tired bones, but you feared that even today, even though you were so exhausted, it would be difficult for you to calm down and actually fall asleep.  
You were worried that a nightmare would wake you up.  
It wasn't anything out of the ordinary anymore, but you didn't know if you'd wake up screaming or even hyperventilating. What if you woke everyone up in the room as well?

You sighed softly.  
Falling asleep frightened you and even more the possible reactions of the others frightened you.  
The shock of your last nightmare was still anchored deep in your bones. The fear you felt every night still made you shiver.

Did the seven boys feel the same way one floor below you? Did they know how pitiful they made you feel?

You frowned. It was pitch black dark and you were still staring at the ceiling, but only now did you notice that your hands weren't as terribly cold as they were in the evening.  
When you were in bed at home, the cold always felt particularly brutal, but in this moment it seemed the opposite.

You had pulled the blanket up to your chest and felt comfortably warm. You wanted to react to this with suspicion and question why it was that way, but your eyelids felt heavy.  
Your head fell to the side and wanted to lie down on the soft pillow, but your subconscious refused. The fear in you too big to just surrender and welcome sleep, but there you were.  
So close to falling asleep.

Your heart didn't seem to want to escape out of your chest, like any other night, and your hands weren't two iceblocks for the first time in a long time.

And then you fell into a deep sleep and hardly remembered why you tried so hard to stay awake.

  
For the next couple of hours it was dead silent. A few snores were sometimes heard, possibly also some animals running around in the garden.  
The hard work of the day seemed to make everyone sleep like a baby.  
Some dreamed of today's events and of flowers so colorful, so free, that they flew around like birds and in the next moment distorted and became plants that were so big that one might have thought they were gigantic.  
Others dreamed of faces, especially the faces of fellow students. Some of them smiled, others looked rather grim.

But one dream seemed particularly strange.  
Maybe it was because of the strange situation, maybe because of the girl who played the main character.

_Her hair was long and dark. She stood with her back to the others in the room. The view was limited. They couldn't look right or left, they couldn't turn their head, just look straight ahead._   
_But even if it were possible, they wouldn't have wanted it. Her presence captivated them._

_The night sky in front of her was clear. A few single clouds floated past and the moon was half full. There was enough moonlight to recognize every curve of her._   
_Her dress waved around wildly. Was it the wind that did it? It wasn't windy, was it?_

_She trembled barely, as if only she could feel how pitiless and cold the night air was. The mood in the room was so heavy that it was only her, who was breathing in and out._

_Did she wear a nightgown? She was barefoot, wasn't she? Why ... why was she in a window frame?_

_The air grew heavier with each passing second._   
_How could she still look so safe and free while standing in the open window and was dangerously close to falling out? Did she feel how people were trying to call out to her?_   
_If the air wasn't so stuffy, would somebody be able to speak up? Would somebody be able to call for her? But what was her name?_

_Time seemed to stop and twist. Her movements were inhumanly slow. Her bright nightgown lay over her curves and found a short rest, only to play crazy and fly around with another gust of wind._   
_Her head now turned to look behind her._

_Who was she looking at? Who did she look at with such hopelessness? To whom did she dedicate the love that shone in her eyes, even now when they were red and puffy? Her face was unknown, no one was able to recognize. The feelings in her eyes were like shooting stars that were about to explode. The familiarity in them was evidence of something that was inexplicable._

_An arm reached out for her. The dreamer couldn't take their eyes off her to find out whose arm that was. She didn‘t seem to be bothered enough. Ignoring the hand, that was trying to get ahold of her, she turned her head around to face the nightsky. She muttered something to herself, that was only meant for the moon._   
_And then she took a step forward and fell. Just then the time decided to go back to normal. She was gone before anybody could have blinked. She had vanished from their sights so fast, that the only thing that was left, was the mere shock._

_**3:07a.m.**_  
Iwaizumi gasped for air. His heart pounded against his chest and he sat up.  
His hands found his neck, where he made sure no one was trying to strangle him because it sure felt that way.  
His eyes were wide open and he didn't exactly know how many times he had to inhale to finally feel like he wasn‘t suffocating.  
His legs were shaking under the covers and his fingers scratched around his neck.

He looked to his right where the second shock awaited him.  
Oikawa, Kuroo, Bokuto, Lev, Terushima and even Satori had also sat up. Everyone's eyes wide open - everyone's chest going up and down, way too quickly.  
The same questions in everyone's mind.

_Did they have the same dream?_   
_If so, then who was she?_

_**▪︎ ♧ ▪︎** _

  
The morning had been calm.  
You slept well for the first time in weeks. You hadn't woken up once, nor had a nightmare.  
Since you had already collected so many plants the day before, you quickly came to the end of your tasks after breakfast.

Every plant marked in red had been found. The yellow-marked plants had also been collected diligently and although the green-marked plants scored in the majority, the group still did a good job.  
Professor Furuya couldn't stop praising all of you - even when you stowed all the plants in the bus that came to pick you up.

Your good mood was contagious, because even Hana seemed to feel at ease, seeing you humming and smiling more often.

After everything was stowed, it was already noon and Hana and you wanted to take a last walk through the large garden before you had to leave.  
Your good mood not only came from your excellent sleep, but also from the fact that the seven boys avoided you this morning.

It was a little strange, you had to admit that, like they had ignored you at breakfast and almost stepped on eachothers feet when stowing the plants, just to distance themselves from you.

"It was nice here," Hana spoke, tearing you out of your thoughts.

Was it?

The landscape was beautiful, but had the excursion been beautiful too? Did you enjoy it? You didn't know. You couldn't say exactly how you took all of this in and felt about it, but you found out a lot of new things. Even your fear had subsided. You no longer saw the boys as demons who were here to make your life more difficult - even if they might have been.  
You had also seen their normal side, the one that really belonged to them, the one that even their closest friends knew. How could you still fear and hate them like you did a day ago?

"You know," you started and your arm with hers, "it actually was really nice here."

Hana looked down at your arms and grinned to herself. Usually she was the one who did that gesture.

"We should plan a trip together ... this time really only the two of us", she suggested and you laughed.

"That sounds good ... have you ever been to Disney Land?"

"No you? Why am I asking at all. You suggested the idea and I no longer accept a no! We absolutely have to go there! ”  
She pulled on your arm to shake it back and forth with hers.

"Ha- **AH** -na! Yes, I promise! “, You cried and tried to free yourself from her grip,„ You really have a lot of strength!“

"Yeah, of course I do, didn't you see my serves yesterday?", She replied, "Like _BOOM KABOOSH_ ... _swoosh_ or something. I don't remember what exactly they had called it."

You had made your round and now arrived at the front yard. With a sad expression on her face, Hana pointed to the others, who were about to get on the bus. She was about to complain and you probably would have joined in, when someone's voice interrupted you.

"Hey, can we talk for a minute?"  
You didn't have to turn around to know who that voice belonged to. You sighed. Their gonna-avoid-you tactics hadn't lasted long.

"Do you want to keep the middle row free for us?", You said to Hana, "I'll be right there!"  
You looked at her with pout and she smiled timidly. She understood.

"Sure ... see you in a bit." Before she left, she turned to the boys and waved.

Only when she was several meters away from you, did you whirl around to focus on Iwaizumi.

For a millisecond, he remembered his dream when he saw you turn around.  
His heart contracted painfully as the memory flooded his mind and made him swallow hard.

"This trip ... had been fun. Let’s not ruin that with words that don’t bear fruit anyway,” you said.  
You looked away from Iwaizumi, who was wearing a washed-out denim jacket and looked over at Oikawa, whose eyes were gentler, especially today. His long, brown coat made him look more mature, quite a contrast to his reputation as a cute charmer. Even the brown hair that fell loosely on his forehead on such a morning, framed his face and gave him the young look that made him look so cute to all girls.  
Your eyes fell back on Iwaizumi when you heard him laugh contemptuously. It had been short, almost a mix of a snort and a sigh.

"I think it's such an important issue that it just can't wait any longer and we'd like to get this out of the way before we get back."  
He crossed his arms over his chest.  
You nodded thoughtfully.

"Okay ... what's up?" You asked.

" _The woman in red_. Afuru. How well do you know her?"

" _Ruber_ -", Kuroo didn't finish whatever else he had to say, muffled his concern and took a step towards you. You assumed that was the real name of Iwaizumi.  
A shiver ran down your spine.  
Kuroo looked past him, staring at Oikawa and then Lev. Because of them, Iwaizumi knew about Afuru.

"I hardly know her, I saw her for the first time that day," you said, and Iwaizumi seemed dissatisfied.

"Lev and Oikawa thought you two seemed very friendly," he said and the tone in his voice was reproachful enough to sour your mood.

"The day before...", you began to confess, "I met her too, somehow."

"What shape did she took, when appearing in front of you?"  
The question triggered goosebumps on your skin.

"As an old woman," you said, "Granny ... that's what we call her."  
The same contemptuous laugh again, but this time he took a step towards you and the others immediately followed. Everyone except Tendou, who stayed in the background and didn't dare to.

"What did you talk about?"  
This question caught you by surprise.  
You frowned.

"Why should I tell you that?" Came your counter question.

"What?", He turned briefly to the others, "did you hear that?!"

"Well, if you remember, you said you would explain everything to me soon. I think I've been waiting long enough. I don't have to tell you anything if you don't tell me anything either. "

"You don't know what you're talking about. You don't even know what could happen-“ For the first time you heard a different feeling resonating in Iwaizumi's voice. Not the anger that usually accompanied him. "Do you think it's wise when a _human_ knows too much?"

"Okay, now let's calm down," Kuroo said.

"I'm not a big fan of the idea," Oikawa shrugged, "but we're in a situation where we no longer have the right to be picky about our secrets."

"She deserves the truth," Lev looked at you with an intensity that shocked you every time.

"Shut up," Terushima said and shook his head, "you're way too deep in this, _Purpu_ "  
Lev, whose other name didn't seem to please him, now turned his body to Terushima and ominously towered over him.

"You have the courage to say something like that to me? After you, first in line, broke all the rules and went to her. You threw yourself on her and now you try it on this track? Honestly ... Terushima- _ **san**_?"  
Lev put on the smile you always found kind of creepy. His eyes focused on the blond boy who grimaced angrily.  
Kuroo looked at you, curiosity too great to see how you reacted to all of this, but then stood between the two to prevent a possible fight.

" _Caeru_ \- ... Tendou, don't you have anything to say?" Kuroo asked from his position between Lev and Terushima.  
The redhead was a few meters away from you and was looking everywhere else, just not at you.  
He opened his mouth to say something and you didn't know if he was going to bother to interfere or say he didn't care anyway, but it never happened. He closed his mouth again, buried his hands in his pockets and shrugged. He looked down at the floor and parted from the group to quietly go to the bus.

"I made the decision to stay home. I'm telling you this because I wanted to see the satisfaction your expressions would give me. My grades are good enough. I can afford to take a little break. I want my old life back. I want the boys to be able to find themselves again. Whatever you have planned ... I don't care. I don't care whether it takes a month to get rid of you or two months. The day will come when I hope you can't control the boys anymore."

  
This seemed unexpected. You almost felt bad, but only because they wore the faces of your fellow students.

  
"It's pretty annoying, isn't it? When you suddenly have no influence on someone who you thought to be incredibly easy to influence. This is my farewell. The feelings we feel are easy to ignore, you know. I am strong enough. Oh, and ... I honestly hope ... I honestly hope that someday the day will come when you experience the same fear that all of you made me experience."

You just didn't know that whatever triggered that dream had brought along, a distant fear that even Iwaizumi couldn't bury completely.

They watched you leave and Bokuto hadn't noticed how long he had actually held his breath until he was going blue and Kuroo had to hit him on the arm, making him grasp for air.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> if you liked this chapter, please tell me which part you liked best and who was your favourite??? I strive off thatttttt!!
> 
> Also I'm just curious in general: From the seven boys, who would you say is your favourite? Maybe even regarding this fanfic and their sins. Like if Bokuto is your fav in general, is there another guy who you find interesting depending on their sin?
> 
> Please feed me with opinions and comments aaa


	14. let me follow

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello!!! I hope you guys liked the wholesomeness of the last chapter, I sure had fun writing that and showing some of the other guys that we love. I might bring more back soon but it just gets kind of hard to do so since I already have to write seven of them. 
> 
> Anyway there's some important stuff for you guys in the end notes! Hope you check that out later!!! 
> 
> A special thank you to Sophie_The_Witch for Beta reading! <3

> _**xx we come undone and if you need to, you can break me too xx** _

Your apartment building was beginning to feel like a prison.

You had kept your word and had not gone back to your university for a whole week.

It was the little, special something that gave you the last push, that persuaded you to actually do it.

Because after the trip ended and you started your journey home, there had been a strange mood on the bus that didn't pull only _you_ down.  
It was a strange kind of heat that had spread throughout the bus.  
Nothing seemed to help - not the countless windows that were opened, no fifteen-minute stop; nothing stopped the heat, that leaked out of a special kind of hellhole.

It was not warm outside and there had been no such problems on the way there.

The bus driver had checked the engine several times during one of the countless breaks and had literally wanted to turn the bus upside down in the hopes of finding the reason. Maybe an engine part was heating up? Maybe the bus was going to go up in flames soon?

But when you took one single look back, you knew better.

It was hard to put into words what you had seen.  
Part of the reason for this was probably the fact that your communication with the boys went deeper than a simple exchange of words. It has always been more than that. It has always been your eyes that talked to each other, your body that revealed what you really felt.

So when you looked at them - the first time since you had sat down - you were left speechless.

They had been sitting there with their legs spread out. One or the other had sunk into the seat so much that his long legs were spread out over the narrow aisle. Their backs were pressed against the soft seat and for some reason their posture exuded pure dominance.  
Their heads leaned against the seat as they stared ahead. The eyelids nearly closed, the eyes just half-open, the mouth drawn into a thin line that gave their entire expression something oddly grumpy.  
But something burned behind their facade that, although you were just as hot as everyone else, sent a cold shiver down your spine.

Their eyes burned on you, the same way this abnormal heat burned on all of you.

You waved your hand in front of your face but the air in here seemed to turn all the laws of nature upside down.

Several boys had taken off their jackets, some even their sweaters, and were now sitting there with a simple t-shirt.

The girls at the front couldn't do that and tried to fan wind into their faces but to no avail. Nothing helped in this bus, that came straight out of hell.

With a single glance at the back, you knew that it was because of them.

Was it because you told them you'd stay away from them? Was it because of their strange mood this morning?

You couldn't exactly say why, but that was just another reason to stay away.

When the bus - this time after four hours of driving because of the many breaks - arrived in the city, you finally recognized the first streets.

Soon they drove near your district and the heat on the bus was unbearable. You asked the bus driver to stop in front of your apartment complex and he did you that favor.

You were sure that they already knew where you lived, which is why you didn't care anymore.  
The bus stopped near the private car driveway and you waved to Hana, who was already struggling with lifting her hand to wave back. The door opened for you and you assumed the cold autumn air would hit you, as soon as the door opened but that wasn‘t the case. You managed to walk down the three stairs and hardly felt any change.  
Only when both of your feet met the stone path, were you able to breathe out a sigh of relief.  
The cold wind made you shake and freeze immediately as it crashed onto your sweaty skin.  
You didn't even want to turn around, took big steps towards the entrance, but felt the many stares on your back.

The group of sins had struggled to sit up to look out the window. Was it really the last moment, the last memory they would have of you? If you left now, what then?

Even if it was difficult to look away from you, they still noticed the person who just came out of the building you were walking into.

Her red high heels, long legs, red coat along with the knowing smile on her face, which was framed by dark, long hair, irritated them.

She walked past you and for a brief moment when you were standing right next to each other, it felt like a tense cut that tore through the air.

Your hand found the door handle, which you unsuspectingly pushed down. You disappeared into the large building, while Afuru turned left and, before she was lost in a crowd, waved to the bus, causing the boys to stare after her, now restless and panicked.

**_▪︎ ♧ ▪︎_ **

You hadn't left your apartment for the first six days.

Hana brought you some food she had cooked on some days and said she wanted to make sure you ate enough.

Your daily routine consisted of feeding Tofu, having breakfast yourself, drinking tea, doing something for the university, somehow finding something to do until it was getting dark, feeding Tofu again, and talking to Hana until midnight.

The seventh day, however, you ran out of supplies and you decided to go shopping in the morning.

Then you noticed the talking.

It started in the elevator when you wanted to go shopping.

Two young girls got in with you and the smaller of the two pressed the button.

"Were they back yesterday morning?" Asked the taller one.

You pushed yourself into the background and didn’t mean to eavesdrop, but your headphones were so tangled that you had no other choice.

"Yes!" exclaimed the other excitedly. She slightly pushed out her lower lip and pouted. “But they're still pretty unapproachable. They don't even greet back ..."

"Oh, wow, well sooner or later they have to. They’re here every morning."

"Do you think they have girlfriends who live here?" The smaller girl's voice grew uncertain.

"All the other girls in the neighborhood say they were never seen with a girl. When I was going to go shopping with my mother yesterday, she just looked at them and said something was wrong with them. Every time she now spots them, she tries to question and shoo them away ... ugh, it’s so embarrassing."

"My mother watches them out the window every morning because she thinks they're out for trouble!"

"It's so embarrassing, they don't do anything to anyone."

You swallowed hard. Your hands came to a stop and your headphones almost threatened to fall out of your hand.

 _That could be anyone_ , you thought. Any group of boys, who walked around in places they really shouldn’t be.

"Did you see them _today_?" asked the girl in front of you and twirled her house keys back and forth. She glanced up above the door, where it told you which floor you were on, then looked down at her hands and sighed.

Her friend shook her head and there was a strange feeling in your gut - a certain premonition.

When you finally arrived on the ground floor and the doors opened with a ping, you were the first to get out. A bit clumsy and hurried, you had fought your way past them and accidentally bumped into them.

They called something after you but you were already out the front door before you could hear what was said.

You felt the cool wind that instinctively urged you to button up your jacket. Your eyes scanned the wide entrance area, afraid you would see the _seven sinners_ again. Your heart wasn’t alarming you by laying uncomfortably in your chest for once, your body felt as heavy as it did the past seven days, so you rejected the silent fear that boiled within you.

The paranoia that they would jump out of some corner and make you feel the way you were used to, still took up a big portion of your mind.

It was strange how devastatingly sad you felt the entire week without them.

You told them you'd be fine - that you could easily fight off the feelings you all felt - but it was getting harder to admit that every day became drearier.

You had legitimately endured the five phases of grief, feeling like you had lost a family member because of the fact that these feelings simply could not be suppressed and drowned.

Although there was still a certain rage inside of you when you thought that you couldn't shake them off, you had reached the phase of acceptance, that made you a little more understanding.

You accepted your unusual situation, the change it had caused in your life, and the feelings that suddenly hit you so hard that you could hardly breathe at night.

You also accepted that there was no easy way out. Something had to happen for all of this to end. Maybe Kuroo had rubbed off to you because it was incredibly difficult for you to act against your pride to finally listen and hear them out.

But then you had to rethink - admit to yourself that maybe it wasn't _pride_ that was the obstacle here, but your fear that if you let them in somehow, that if you started listening and accepting them, that you would lose their game.  
And then what?

Bokuto and Iwaizumi had given enough details to manifest an unreal fear into your bones. You didn't want to find out what happened if you lost the game.

You were lost in thought and paranoid, as you reached the small supermarket two streets away. You bought everything you needed and had felt like you were in a trance and not even half an hour later, you were already on your way back.

You had really bought a lot. A bag in one hand dangled down and bumped your leg from time to time, which made you tense up and swore quietly under your breath.

The treats for Tofu stuck out of the right bag and scratched your jeans, hurting you every two seconds. The cat litter was so heavy that even the ten-minute walk seemed endless.

The other bag was all for you; hygiene products, some soaps that were on sale and so many vegetables, one might think you would make a stew for twenty men.

You crossed the street, careful not to trip over the median covered in weeds.

Your hands started to hurt, the plastic cut into your palms and you grimaced in pain. When you finally reached the other side, you breathed out in relief, but the feeling that suddenly spread within you made you gasp for air again.

It fluttered in your belly as if thousands of butterflies were hiding there. Your heart was racing and your hands were sweating.  
You had trouble holding the bags.

Your eyes focused on the entrance area, where you directly discovered the source of your reactivated feelings.

Next to the stone paving, which took up the entire area in front of the door, was a low-lying masonry of stone, on which people often sat down. Even now you spotted Satori, Bokuto, and Terushima sitting on it, looking up at the others. Behind them was the hedge fence, which prevented them from leaning too far back, which is why they looked kind of awkward sitting on that small space with their tall figures and long legs.

Oikawa was standing next to Iwaizumi and you noticed that they were talking to each other while Kuroo was nagging on Lev one step further, like a big brother. The gray-haired male stood embarrassed, scratched the back of his head, while two girls from the neighborhood apologized to Kuroo.

One more step was the only thing that was needed for the boys to put aside all of their current conversations at the same time to turn to you. They had turned their heads so in unison that you forgot to breathe for a mere second.

You didn't know who to look at first - their eyes fixed on you, too stubborn to look away, burning on your unsuspecting face.

You wanted to look away, at least to keep the appearance that all this was a coincidence because the girls followed their eyes and now looked at you questioningly.

Who could understand what your relationship was?

Who wouldn't come up with strange thoughts considering that you were a young woman living alone?

You winced, your hands clenched into fists and you felt the plastic cut deeper into your skin.  
Your heart was uncomfortable in your chest as it threatened to jump out as if they were calling for it and were in complete control of your stubborn organ.

You couldn't deny that their presence alone made you feel better - freer, more alive, and happier.  
You hated it.  
Because you had no control over it, not one bit.

Your eyes looked down at the floor. You simply decided to go straight ahead and disappear into the big building without being stopped.

But you couldn't suppress the feeling of pure hope. Not even the strange desire to throw yourself into their arms - whoever caught you first - and your mind advised you to feel disgusted about it, but your heart however ...

Your legs carried you ahead, your eyes were lowered and the grip on the plastic bags grew stronger.

Just before you could get into the building, Iwaizumi came to stop in front of you to block your view of the front door.

You spent a few seconds staring at his chest for the simple reason that you didn't dare look at his face.

All it took for you to lookup was your name rolling over his lips.

"Don't you think it's time to talk to us?"

His voice was strangely gentle. His expression softened and his eyes gave you some insight into what he was feeling after seeing you again. That was unexpected.

You remained silent and took a step to the side to walk past him and hopefully disappear into your apartment, but someone's hand stroked gently over your forearm. The same hand was dragging his fingers down your arm until he found your hand and tried to take your heavy bag.

But you just stubbornly pulled at it, now looked at Kuroo, who didn't even think about giving up this silent fight. His hand stayed there.

"You", you started to speak - even surprised how shaky and squeaky your voice came out - "have some guts ... to show up here."

You kept your voice low and muffled, afraid the girls would notice something, too afraid that someone would look out the window and spot you. You knew how much they were talking in this neighborhood.

"You weren't in-" Bokuto started now, pushing himself off the masonry and you didn't let him finish.

"That's why you came here?" You asked in horror. "I said what I had to say! You ruin ... all of you ruin everything."

"We finally want to tell you and come clean, it's-", you interrupted someone again, this time it was Lev you didn't let finish.

"Isn't that a little late?", The utter hopelessness on your face struck the gray-haired male, like lightning, "I avoided you for a reason. Let's just pretend we don't know each other. I have a reputation to lose ... I-I live here alone, that's weird enough and now you ... "

You were a stuttering mess.  
It all looked bad.

Again you tried to pull your hand back to get rid of Kuroo’s. He let go, albeit reluctantly, but your expression was enough for him to give you some space.

"P-Please stop coming here," you whispered. Your heart was beating so fast, you thought you could feel it pounding in every fiber of your body.

Oikawa looked at you - lost. He had never seen you like this and you were right because the two girls immediately started whispering.

"We are sorry," he whispered back, quiet enough for only you to hear. The distance between you hopefully far enough not to cause unnecessary gossip.

Your lower lip trembled barely, but you laughed contemptuously.

"I don't need your help," you said, clutching the plastic in your hands all the more tightly, "and I don't need your apologies either."

You scurried past them so fast that the only thing that was left was the uncomfortable silence that spread between the seven.

You were right, but why did the reunion hurt so much more than the farewell last week did? Even Iwaizumi felt it in his chest, close to letting out the anger that still yearned for attention in him. He hadn't even gotten around to telling you that you could be in danger. After all, he couldn't think of anything else than Afuru coming out of this building - knowing that she was planning something.

Oikawa looked after you for a long time. It was hard to accept how the dynamic had changed between all of you. It was even harder because he had hoped to see you all week long, to maybe catch you here before going to university, or at least to convince him that you were fine without him having to ask Hana to make sure of it.  
Your blonde friend was definitely fed up with Oikawa, who knew her best and therefore knew how to talk to her so that she would answer, but he was aware that she was only telling him the bare essentials. Did you know that he asked about you every day?  
He doubted it.

Kuroo looked down at his hand, which felt so much colder now that you were gone than a few seconds ago. He knew about your cold hands, but why did his entire body suddenly feel so much colder?

Lev wished he had reached out for you too, insisted on taking the bags from you, and helping you. Perhaps you would have given him a smile as a thank you? Or maybe a tiny touch that would at least bring him over the next few days, because at the moment the greed inside of him felt incredibly starved.

But would Bokuto survive another day? His inside seemed to die of thirst and starve at the same time. Seeing you had helped, but it was like a sip of water that he found after a week without it. But even that little sip couldn’t satisfy the thirst.

Terushima's fingers tingled again. Just like that day in the greenhouse, but this time they tingled for other reasons.  
The need to go after you and ask you not to turn your back on him, much too big.  
The fact that he thought back to the kiss you both shared every single day made him almost go crazy.

Tendou was the only one still sitting on the low stone wall. Instead of staring at the door in which you had just walked through, he looked over the other six.  
His heart also contracted painfully but the reactions you had triggered with such short words made him exhale in relief.  
Was there finally going to be an end?

He was startled when he heard a melodic giggle. It was too familiar.

The redhead turned his body to the source of the laugh and saw Afuru standing there with a questioning look on her face, watching each of them.

"Why are you so down?", She wanted to know when the others had turned to her as well. Iwaizumi's expression immediately soured.

She stood in front of them again in red fashion, like every other time.  
Her eyes fixed on the two girls, who were startled, bowed, and then disappeared into the building.  
Then she broke into the smile again that was dedicated to the seven boys and only them.

"Bad timing, I suppose," she said again, but nobody seemed to know what to answer.

Because of her, they came here every day to make sure you were okay, so what was this weird attempt at small talk?

"Are you living here now?" Kuroo asked. The curiosity too great not to ask.

"Ah," she said, "now I understand… I come by every now and then. "

She wanted to add that she was looking out for you without you knowing it, but they wouldn’t believe that from her.

Iwaizumi took a closer look at the dark-haired beauty, almost overcoming his dislike towards her to ask how likely it was that all seven of them had had the same dream but when he saw her knowing face, he almost stared back in disgust.

After all, he didn't trust her, never had, and probably never would.

"Ah, still the same old you. After all this time, you are still the same distrusting man you always were,” she said.

Something in Iwaizumi stirred with these words. That gentle something swam up to the surface again, that had surprised you earlier.

"Was I?" He asked quietly.

"Oh," Afuru took a step closer, "Is this some kind of curiosity that I’m seeing? Are there finally questions about your past life? You know, as long as I’ve known you, I have never heard you ask. None of you have ever asked about your past life. Usually, a lot of people ask me all kinds of questions like _was I happy_ , _was I successful_ , _did I experience love?_ ... And I always replied that **forgetting is a blessing**."

She threw her hair back, straightened her red coat, and looked around briefly.

"Why are you telling us all this?" Iwaizumi wanted to know.

"Because I’m intrigued, you finally seem to remember something and show curiosity. Is it because of that girl? Ah ... it is, isn’t it? But I have to disappoint you and tell you the same thing I’ve told everyone else. Forgetting is a blessing. I am not your friend nor your foe. You don't have to distrust or fear me. But I guess old habits die hard? You see this is why you seven were always one of my best groups. You were never curious as if you knew enough not to ask questions and preferred not to remember. Inside of you, you still probably do. The curiosity is now there, but you would still prefer not to remember.”

Iwaizumi looked down. A strange shiver ran down his back and he didn't know when he had last felt something like that.

This topic made him weak. His energy waned.

Although she mentioned more than once that forgetting was a blessing, he had never met someone who hadn't forgotten.

"Doesn’t everyone forget," he murmured. It should have been a question, but he said it like a rock-solid fact. It was not a sentence to which he would have expected an answer.

In any case, Afuru broke into yet another smile. This one, though, was different from all the previous ones.

"No. Some have the unfortunate fate of remembering everything. That’s their own little punishment."

Her eyes met Tendou's. A silent conversation passed between them. His eyes felt unusually strained. He finally gave in and looked away, fearing the glow of his eyes to reappear. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So you made it here!!! Thank you for reading and for the many comments!
> 
> Next chapter there will be quite some talking to do that was long needed. But which of our seven boys will be able to reach you for that?  
> Well I hope you guys can leave some comments and feed my poor writers soul with them  
> BUT also let me know who you would want to read more about in that sense?  
> Which boy should get extra time or who should talk with you and answer some questions!  
> Also, let me know if you as MC would have a question for the boys, what would it be? I might put it into the next chapter and answer it!!! 
> 
> I have one of our boys in mind who will shine most next chapter but if you guys have anyone else in mind I might reconsider because I'm open in that part. 
> 
> Thank you so much!! <3


	15. the maze

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry for the long wait!  
> I'm semi back. The virus really put my life onto hold, then it became a nightmare and I'm still struggling with fixing what it done to me.
> 
> But I'm still here. I haven't had this chapter beta read because I'll be gone for a few days and i didn't want you guys to wait any longer! So excuse weird wordings or mistakes! 
> 
> Hope this isn't too confusing but I finally have put in a few explanations and a look back into what might be very confusing for now, but hopefully not in the future!
> 
> Very Haunting of Hill House inspired because i absolutely love that show.  
> But we are coming closer to finding out what happened to the boys and why the sins have become sins and especially what part you, my dear Reader, play in it!
> 
> Enjoy <3

> **_xx tell me it's only a nightmare xx_ **
> 
> * * *

Only a day passed before they sneaked up on you again. This time quite different from the previous ones.

It started when you were eating breakfast.  
Violent knockings on your door. Nonstop.  
You couldn’t enjoy your eggs, you couldn’t even block them out by listening to music. They kept going.  
Every time Tofu immediately hid under your table, his eyes fixed on you as if he already suspected that it was someone he didn't like.

It didn’t even take you one whole minute to get to the door, but the knocking wouldn’t stop. The person behind the door seemed to want to make sure you really came to open it. You unlocked the poor door, pulled it open, and before you could judge the person in front of you, you heard Tofu hissing loudly. You already guessed why, but you couldn't confirm this until your eyes got used to the sunlight shining through the windows in the hallway directly on the person in front of you.  
It was indeed Kuroo whose hand was left dangling in the air, intent on knocking again if you hadn’t opened.

You looked at him with a puzzled look on your face.  
Tofu had come closer and continued hissing at the tall man, all while hiding behind your legs.

The light in the hallway seemed to put Kuroo into a creepy picture; his hair even darker than it already was and the shadow on his face made the pearly white smile he had put on look threatening.

"It's time for our talk," he said confidently, having already placed his foot on your doorstep.

"Oh yeah?" you asked and snorted loudly before you got all serious, "over my dead body."

"That was a little bit overdram-"

He grimaced and put his hands against his waist looking down at you, like a father.

"It's for your own good," he kept trying to convince you.

"Did the conversation yesterday somehow not take place, or what's going on right now?" you asked, visibly irritated about his insistence.

He had wanted to answer, but a neighbor just came by and greeted Kuroo as if he had lived here for years. Kuroo quickly muttered a greeting back, slightly confused but polite enough to reply.

A reluctance gnawed at you that wasn't directly against Kuroo himself, but more at that charming side that Oikawa seemed to possess as well. Your neighbor was proof enough - maybe it was also because you knew that the old man next door was quite traditional and probably respected tall, broad guys more than you.

"Goodbye, Kuroo," you said.

You kicked his foot - a little too soft for your taste - and as soon as he pulled it back in shock, you let the door fall back into its lock.  
Tofu started to rub himself against your legs and you picked him up to go back to finish your breakfast.

The next day was similar.  
There had been several knocks on your door and every time you looked through the door hole, one of them had been standing behind it to convince you to go back to your classes and not wriggle against the conversation that was to take place. You, however, had so little patience left with them that you only turned them away after half a minute.  
But when Iwaizumi knocked on your door, you were briefly too shocked to close the door immediately.

He had come around during dinner time, and you had opened the door grumpily - the chopsticks still in your hand, and a curious Tofu, who, like the previous times, came with you and hid carefully behind the closest piece of furniture just to hiss at whoever was going to bother you.  
You hadn't expected the strange mixture of feelings on his face, which started with the well-known anger and then melted away to a somewhat shy expression.  
You swallowed hard and looked up at him.

"Can we talk?" he asked, the tone in his voice serious.

"Do I have a choice?" You glared at him.

Your grip on the door handle became firmer as you stared at him.  
You couldn't let up, you didn't want to wait for his answer and were already closing the door when his foot suddenly dropped into your threshold to push the door open.

"No", he pushed out through lips that were a little too firmly pressed together, opening the door even further to look at you.

But when he noticed your horrified expression, clouded with fatigue, his features relaxed and he took a deep breath to think more clearly.

"Yes... you do," he finally said and that took you by surprise. 

He gave you the choice to decide and you have been seeing some kind of changes in him. He even tried to get a better grip on himself when he spoke to you. But you were stubborn.  
So you just nodded, looked down at his foot on your doorstep, and then back into his eyes to show him your questioning look of disapproval. If he really meant it, he would have to show you that.

He sighed but took his foot back.  
As quietly as you could, you closed the door again and went back into your kitchen.

That night you dreamt of another place, another time, and saw the world through the eyes of another person.

* * *

**_Another era - 1952._ **

_You were exhausted. All the running around had exhausted you, but your smile was still plastered onto your face.  
_ _Your hands bored into the fabric of your dress. You didn't want to go home dirty and the dress was one of your favorites - one, your husband had given you some time ago.  
_ _The finely trimmed grass under your soles did not crumple anymore, you had walked over it so often that you almost felt sorry for it.  
_ _A few scattered flowers, which you passed by very carefully, tickled your bare ankles, which brought a giggle out of you every time.  
_ _For a moment you had to think of the old woman who lived below you on the first floor and who might just scold you for looking and behaving so inappropriately “why would you pull your dress up that far? Think of all the men!”, but the freshly cut grass and the dirt road around you would ruin your beautiful dress in no time._

_You took a few more steps and slipped right back into the big maze you had just come out of. Quickly, you pressed yourself against one of the labyrinth walls, which consisted of twigs and leaves that tickled and poked into your back.  
_ _The excitement inside you rose, your fingertips tingled and your heartbeat in your chest was so strong that you could feel it in every fiber of your body.  
_ _Would he find you soon?_

_You wanted to be found, you wanted to see the complete, pure joy on his face that he showed you, every time he found you. At the same time you didn't want to be found and you wanted to run around a little further while he was looking for you. That feeling of knowing he was behind you, chasing you, was the most exciting feeling ever.  
_

_You had been playing catch for some time. He had brought you to this beautiful garden and you had picnicked together.  
_ _Although the sun was gradually setting and trying to say goodbye, you did not think about stopping._

_You tried to get your breathing under control to listen more closely. If you were lucky, you would hear him and he would chase you again through the front part of the garden where you would pass the flowerbed and walk towards the fountain._

_The labyrinth was in the back part of the enormous garden where you thought he was at.  
_ _You hadn't heard from him for several minutes, so you looked right and left and made your way to the front part where you had arranged to meet when it got dark._

_There was still such bliss sticking to you, mixed with adrenaline that turned your steps into little jumps. The light dress flowed down on you perfectly and swung a little higher with each additional hop, so you had to be careful.  
_ _You had underestimated the sunset, as the five-minute walk from the labyrinth to the flowerbed was enough to steal even the last rays of the sun and plunge you and the garden into a dark blue.  
_ _Normally you weren't afraid of the dark, but something just sent a shiver down your spine._

_Your feet carried you away without you having to look around much. Your body had already remembered every corner and you were secretly quite happy about it. The increasing darkness was a bit frightening.  
_ _Soon you saw the high hedges that hid the fountain and the stone path behind it.  
_ _Only a few more steps and you would be at your destination._

_You turned your head around for a moment, then caught a glimpse of the labyrinth. Maybe he would come out of it and run after you?  
_ _You looked around, saw no one, and wanted to turn around again, but walked straight into someone's chest.  
_ _Confused, you looked up and your smile faded._

_"Easy there, angel," said the man in front of you, and your smile found its way back to your face._

_Only now did you notice the five other men standing behind him._

_"____!", you shouted happily. You had said his name, it had rolled over your lips, as it had done so for years, but for some reason, you hadn’t heard yourself say it._

_Maybe you were just too exhausted. "How did you know we were here?"_

_"Mrs. ____ let us know. Said you left early and came here," he told you._

_"We knocked a little too often," ____ added behind him. Again you were sure you knew his name. But it seemed to slip your mind when you thought of it, like a dream you had just woken up from; the thought of it still fresh, yet already so far away that it could never be remembered again. "She came out with a giant wooden spoon, I tell you, ____ here was ready to run off.”_

_He pointed to the grey-haired one among you and you could have sworn that just a second ago seen no special characteristics.  
_ _But now you recognized his gray hair and green eyes, the iris so small that he looked almost dangerous. But that was one of your childhood friends, so why did you seem to notice all these things just now?_

_Even the man you had just bumped into, now had unmistakable black hair that stood up on his head.  
_ _Yet you laughed, you couldn't really control your features, nor your actions, or your thoughts, as if you were watching an old movie._

_"Where is ____?," asked the brown-haired man among them. The brown eyes soft and warm as they focused on you._

_He was asking about your beloved husband._

_"He's still busy looking for me, I'm afraid," you replied, smiling at the thought of him._

_"Oh, let me guess, you played another round of catch?" it came from... from... ...Kuroo. Was that his name?_

_You noticed he had already taken off his gloves, the brown pair was now stuffed into his breast pocket._

_"You are very observant, my lord," you said, raised an eyebrow and looked at him defiantly._

_You barely noticeably bowed at him. The skirt of your dress was still in your hands. "He will be glad to see you."_

_"We are here for both of you," said... Oikawa?_

_"I would love to play as well" Terushima affirmed, taking a step towards you, as brisk as ever, and looking at you just as challenging. "How much do you bet we'll be better finders?"_

_You rolled your eyes - playfully dramatic._

_"I will not let my husband lose face in your presence. He will win," you said, smiling, which the six men in front of you mirrored._

_For a brief second, you looked over to Satori, who then winked at you. Out of all the people here, he was your bestest and longest friend, although you knew them all for almost as long._

_"You heard the lady," it now came from Kuroo, who turned to the others, "we'll give her a head start.”_

_Immediately, Bokuto's eyes flashed open and he took a step in your direction eager to win this._

_You stretched out your right arm slightly and pointed shyly at the group, then you lifted your index finger, looking like you were going to scold them._

_"You know the rules, my lords, so I don't expect any cheating."_

_Kuroo right in front of you raised his eyebrows before his face relaxed and he gave you a smile that gave you goosebumps. You swallowed hard.  
_ _Something flashed in his eyes that blew your own smile off your face for a millisecond._

_“Cheating? Us?" he asked, "Never. Now run along, because if we catch you, the game is over and we'd like to delay that a bit.”_

_You nodded, laughed loudly, and already got ready to run back towards the labyrinth.  
_ _You guessed that when they didn't see you anymore, they would come after you._

_He would be happy to see them again._

_Hardly a long time passed without the six men coming to visit you, but lately, it had been harder to meet all of them at once. Understandable, since each of them had his own busy life, but it was always hard to imagine them apart.  
_ _You had grown up with them, had seen them together all the time, and almost thought it would stay that way forever. Of course, after you grew up, a lot changed. Especially since you and... Iwaizumi got together and got married after you finished school.  
_ _Your husband had no brothers or sisters, no big family, at least none with whom he shared his blood because the other six were his brothers and would probably always remain his brothers._

_They had often expressed how happy they were that you were the one he married.  
_ _You were happy. So happy that you woke up with a smile every morning at the sight of your husband next to you and the feeling of having such good and close friends who were still in your lives and would always remain a part of it.  
_ _Your future children would probably be happy to have six uncles and you had no doubt that they would love your children as if they were their own._

_You couldn't get any further because strong arms wrapped around your form.  
_ _Hajime had finally found you and you couldn't help but instinctively breathe in his scent while you put your arms around his neck and snuggled closer to him.  
_ _As he held you close, he could see the familiar faces of his friends running after you._

_"Brothers!" he called out._

_You looked him in the face, smiling at the sight of his smile widening, but even if you let go of each other, he would never let go of you fully. He had made it a habit, that you absolutely loved. His warm hand found your cold one and it was already an instinct how he first clasped your index finger without even noticing and then took your hand in his to hold it for as long as possible._

_"You are back?" he asked and first hugged Tetsurō._

_"Lev has accepted a job near you," explained Kōtarō and pushed past Tetsurō to hug Hajime._

_"That means my lady and I can look forward to more visits from you?"  
_ _Hajime smiled at you. You smiled back._

_"But only if she makes the pie we like so much. Isn't that right, brothers?", Tōru looked at you, raised his eyebrows, and wouldn’t have accepted a no._

_"Of course!" you assured them._

_Your gaze wandered over the group in front of you and stayed on Satori. He stared at you, with eyes wide open and your name on his lips.  
_ _You blinked and as if you had changed a scene in a film, you suddenly found yourself somewhere else._

_It smelled like home. Your home. The familiar smell that awaited you when you opened the door. But you did not recognize this apartment._

_The window was wide open and you caught yourself shaking all over. It was so dark outside, you wondered why the lights weren't on, but what was waiting for you when you looked down on the floor you would have seen even without the moonlight shining in._

_Seven bodies.  
_ _Blood so much blood._

_There was so much blood everywhere that you couldn't recognize the tiles underneath.  
_ _And as you gasped hard for breath, you felt a shiver run down your back._

_The feeling that was now spreading inside you brought tears to your eyes, made your heart pound in your chest, and paralyzed you completely.  
_ _You wanted to cry. But only when you recognized the bloodstained faces of the corpses in front of you could you let those tears go. They fell and rolled down your cheeks, with no end in sight._

_Those were your boys._

_And it was their blood that decorated the walls and cooled under your bare feet._

_You counted through. One, Lev; two, Bokuto; three, Kuroo; four, Oikawa; five, Terushima; six; Iwaizumi and seven; Tendou._

_A sob broke through your completely frozen body and got stuck in your throat. Your legs trembled, you were afraid to fall, but you felt someone's hand on your upper arm. You turned around._

_"Is everything alright?" Tendou asked behind you and took another step so that he was standing right next to you._

_You flinched.  
_ _Your head snapped back forward so fast that you feared your neck would break, but that was the least of your worries, because in front of you, in the same room, it was bright now. It was daytime, the sun was shining and the tiles and walls weren’t covered with bloodstains._

_There were no bodies lying on the floor, they apparently never had, because you saw no sign of them. Just the fact that Tendou stood behind you and did not lie dead at your feet was proof enough._ _You were on the verge of collapsing, but you swallowed all that and forced yourself to smile, which still couldn't hide your tears or the shocked expression on your face.  
_ _With your whole body, you turned back to Tendou, reaching out to him almost thoughtlessly, but stopping before you touched his cheek._

_His grip on your upper arm became tighter for a moment - you welcomed the pain he was causing. Then he let go of you and you blinked away the tears._

_"I'm sorry, I seem to be a bit beside me today."_

_With shaky legs you walked towards the door, turned around one more time to make sure he was still standing there - and he was - before you left the room._

You woke up with a scream. A scream so loud, you feared someone would call the police on you thinking someone was being murdered in here.  
The feeling this dream had created in you was worse than death.

You sat up in a panic, threw the blanket off you, and noticed your familiar room.  
This was your bed and your apartment in Tokyo. That was your cat, Tofu, jumping onto your bed while your heart was literally trying to escape from your chest.

It was pounding on your front door. You almost feared that it was an annoyed neighbor you had disturbed, but your desk clock told you that it was only 9 pm.

Tofu started hissing.

Was it one of them?

Your stomach turned, the dream still too fresh and traumatizing to forget. All that blood...

The uninterrupted knocking stopped for five seconds before starting all over again.  
You stood up, your legs were shaking terribly - just like in your dream.

You pressed your hand against your mouth, unsure if you would actually throw up after all that.

You stumbled out of your room, Tofu was on your heels and wouldn't stop hissing.

When you arrived in your hallway, you put your hand on the doorknob and thought about looking out through the door hole, but you were far too distracted by your trembling fingers wrapping around the doorknob.  
You pushed down the cold metal and with one click the door opened.  
Not a whole second passed when you saw Tendou rush in.  
Before you could react, his long arms had wrapped themselves around your trembling form and pushed you towards him.  
So hard and so firm that you stumbled backward together due to the impact - against the front door, which fell into lock.  
He made no attempt to move, leaned against the door, and held you while the shock anchored itself to your bones and settled there.

Your head nested between his shoulder blade and found the best possible place there.  
He smelled sweet for a moment, before a spicier smell rose up your nose and, like mint, crept down your throat coldly.

His body seemed to burn. Why was he so warm?

"You are on fire," he muttered into your hairline as if he had read your thoughts.

So you were the one who was so warm? You weren't used to that.

You were too exhausted to maintain your stubbornness and keep up your image.  
Your arms wrapped around his body, clinging to his back, and you clenched your hands into fists.

"What's happening to me?" it came softly from you. Your voice had sounded so squeaky and hoarse that you only realized you had said it when a few seconds had passed. "I am afraid."

"I'm sorry. I'm so incredibly sorry," he said, the voice of Tendou, but the undertone in it was marked by a sadness that didn't seem to come from him. It was deeper, older ... different.

"What happened?", he finally asked, but only after he was sure that you had calmed down a bit.

He let go of you a little, took a step back, but left you at arm's length.

You swallowed hard, looked over into your bedroom, and recalled the memories of your dream. This made him wonder, for he followed your gaze, saw the ambivalent expression on your face, and reached for your hand to go ahead.  
He pulled you behind him as if someone was waiting for you.  
And in his thoughts, someone did, because he was thinking of Afuru, who, to all appearances, was not a stranger to this building.

You refused to go further and your hand separated from his, which made him stop and turn around immediately.

You looked at each other wordlessly and for a millisecond you remembered the blood-drenched face of him that had haunted you in your dream and you twitched so hard that you almost threw up.

"I had a nightmare," you said, whispering the last word.

Because that was what it had been, right? The worst nightmare you had ever had. Just a dream.

"About what?" he asked. He had now turned his body all the way to you and ignored your cat, who watched you with attentive eyes.

You remained silent, looked down, swallowed hard, and shook your head.  
He seemed to understand.

"Okay, let's talk about what we have been meaning to talk to you about," he said and went ahead into your room. The bed was unmade and you were a little ashamed.

"Do you want some tea?" you asked in a shaky voice and stood undecidedly in the doorway while he looked around your room.

He shook his head and reflexively reached out to you. It looked like those charming gestures that men today use only too rarely.

You were a little insecure again. Should you accept his hand? Put your hand in his?  
Your palm began to tickle and you took that as a clear sign to press your hands flat against your legs.

His eyes followed your every move, and you didn't know how to describe them because they were half-open as usual, but something sharp in them made you pay close attention.

"You live pretty high up," he noted, went to your window, and looked out.

You thought he was admiring the view, but instead, he tilted his head, took another step towards the window, and clicked his tongue in annoyance.  
With nimble hands, he closed the window and then turned to you.

"Windows and high floors make me nervous," he told you.

"I understand," you replied and he stopped there. Between you and the window, as if something dangerous was lurking outside, waiting to come and get you. "I'll be right back."

You went to the closet in your hallway, took the pillows and a blanket that you had prepared for possible guests in winter, and went back to set them up in the middle of your room so that you could sit comfortably on the fluffy red carpet.

"Please," you said and pointed to the many pillows you had laid out for him, "sit down.”

"Thank you," he said, plopped down on the two larger cushions, and stretched his arms out.

You sat down and watched him.  
Luckily you had only taken a nap, so you weren’t sitting in your pajamas.  
Nevertheless, you sensed that you looked terrible and tried to smooth your hair a little bit with - still shaky - hands.

He laughed as you tried to make yourself look passable and you quickly stopped.

"You've already figured a lot out by yourself, huh?", the question suddenly came and you thought for a moment.

"You didn't make it easy for me, but yeah, I could put some things together myself."

"I guess I'll start at the beginning?" he said, more to himself than it was to you. "The others and I have been in this kind of work for as long as I can think."

"Work?" you asked, giving him a doubtful look.

"That sounds nicer than when I start talking about myths and legends, doesn't it?" - he grinned, but it didn't reach his tired eyes - "The legend is true somehow, kind of. The seven deadly sins, I mean. One day we were simply what we now are, without remembering much of our lives before this. If you live long, forgetting is the best thing that can happen to you."

"Why are you here?" you asked. "I mean… here with us. Why these boys, why me?"

"Slow down," he replied, "we are sent to certain places. Some we are allowed to choose. Usually, schools and universities are easy. Young people always sin, but..."

He hesitated. Whatever was on the tip of his tongue seemed to take some effort to get him to say it at all.

"I’ve already been told that you and Iwaizumi usually choose." You told him, which seemed to make him continue. It was often mentioned that these two boys contributed more to the selection than the others.

"That is correct. I choose, Iwaizumi agrees or disagrees. You were chosen because there is something special about you. Something that is beginning to change us."

He now sat up and looked at you with piercing eyes.

"The others couldn't guess that I chose you for this reason, and with every day that passed and with every one of your stubborn actions and fightings against our manipulations, I became more and more sure that you were the right one for this."

"Right one for what?" You frowned.

"We'll start at the beginning. That's what I was saying... Usually, we get someone to sin. It's quite simple, and because it's so simple, we've invented our own little game. _The hunt_. How dull, isn't it? Doesn't it sound incredibly boring?"

"I thought you enjoyed hurting people," you accused him.

"Maybe, yes, maybe such a long time has passed that we find fun in it now, but it's just a pathetic attempt to cling to some kind of feeling we haven't felt since we died."

He got louder.  
You flinched back, memorizing his words, especially the mention of their death.  
But he just kept talking.

"If we can do it; if one of us wins the game, we are allowed to have a few seconds of feeling an emotion. A poor copy of the human feeling for malicious pleasure. But even joy that is done at the costs of others is joy, so you accept that. You accept what you can get. You become your worst self and chase this feeling, chase after wanting to feel something, anything, forgetting that you play with people and lead them to eternal damnation. And then it starts all over again. New place, new players, new victim, new round. For the others, it is fun - somehow. They know nothing else."

"But you do?" you questioned, and Tendous' eyes looked at you as if they could see into your soul.

"I am different from them," he confessed, but you could tell him that you would not learn more about it here and now. "When I saw you, I was sure that our eternal repetition and getting stuck in time while we play this evil game could end."

"Because of me?"

"Yes," he said, suddenly leaned back and let himself fall backward. A smile was on his lips that put another question into your head.

"What will happen to me?"

"Sooner or later you will let one of us in, but it is already too late for us to take your soul."

He saw your panicked expression.

"The feelings we've been chasing all these years are now hitting us like a car on a highway. We will lose the game, because even if you let us in... none of us will be able to send you to utter damnation. As much as I hate to admit it, the protective instinct that is now there is too great to ignore."

You swallowed.

"What happens to the boys?" You pointed to his chest, knowing that the real Tendou was hidden somewhere in there and put to the side.

"They'll go on with their lives when we're done here."

"And when will you be done?!", you panicked.

His silence was answer enough.  
He didn’t know. You didn't either.  
Neither you, nor the others, nor Afuru, who perhaps even listened in from somewhere.

"But I have one question for you," you heard Tendou say and you looked up.

"Do you think time is linear?"

For some reason, the question gave you goosebumps. Not the bad kind you have when you get bad news or it's too cold, this one was different.

"I read something once that I would like to take as an answer," you said, "I read that time is all around us. It falls down like snow. Time is not a friend that we see when we get older or see its mark on our faces, it is not the wrinkles or the objects that lie in the corner and gather dust, but rather something that is always present, without a direct order.”

He smiled.

"There was this girl I once knew. She had a similar perspective."

"She sounds very wise," you said - half-jokingly.

"Oh, she was."

"What happened to her?" you wanted to know.

"Time happened. But I knew that one day I would see her again."

You wanted to smile at him, it was a lovely moment - peaceful and so human - when his expression changed so quickly that you had to blink in shock to make sure that really happened.

"I should have listened to her," he confessed. The undertone in his voice was bittersweet, the expression serious. He had pulled his legs towards him and leaned his elbow against his knee. "She came to me to tell me how she felt. How she really felt, she would never have confided in anyone else as she did in me. I didn't listen and waved her off. She reached out to me and wanted my help and I just turned her away, dismissed her, suspecting she was sick. Simply ruled it down to sickness. It was different back then. Mental illness was- ... but she wasn’t sick. If I had listened to her and had given her the right advice ... the advice she needed ... she … we... well, I guess we wouldn't have stopped talking."

He smiled again, but this one was just like his last; clouded by a sadness that even touched and shook through your body.

"I should go," he said, already standing up. "The others will kill me when they hear about this. That you let me in and not them."

He laughed - it sounded very fake.

"T-Thank you," you stuttered out, "I mean... thank you for the conversation. I'll process all this and-"

"and come back to school tomorrow?" he interrupted you.

"Possibly, yes."

"In the future, if you have any questions, I will answer them."

"Thank you," you said.

You were grateful, even though all this new information was heavy on your stomach.

"Would you," he said as he walked out, standing in the doorway, "save my number? I guess... more like Tendous's number, but if something happens to you, you can call me.”

"What's gonna happen to me?"

You really didn't know if it was a trick, but you found it odd how carefully he asked.

"I don't want to take any risks," he whispered as if he feared someone would listen.

"Okay," you nodded, came up to him, and asked for his cell phone.

He gave you a slightly older model with a purple phone cover and an ice cream charm hanging down on the side of it.  
You had to smile slightly, typed your number, and give him the phone back.

"Be safe."

And with those words he left, leaving you to wonder about everything that had happened today.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> please leave me some comments? I crave for feedback or analysis or opinions TELL ME WHAT YOU THOUGHT OF THIS! HAVE YOU SEEN SOME PARALLELS? HAVE YOU MAYBE FIGURED IT OUT? HMMMM??? HMMMMMMMMMM


	16. enlightenment, worry and starry eyes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy new year! This is my new year 2021 present for all of you. :)  
> Thank you so much for your patience and all the love I have received on this fanfic. And thank you for everyone commenting, they always mean the most for me.  
> I have incredible and patient readers and I can't believe we have come this far.  
> Originally I have had only planned one or max two chapters for this fanfic but now we are on Chalter 16! And still going strong! And i couldn't have made that without all of your support and love. xx

The very next day you were back at the university.

The weather had changed, it was not as cold as it was the last few days, and even the wind seemed to blow differently today.

You had dreamed again, experienced again - without your knowledge - the same things in your dream, which this time had not let you go after waking up. No, this time they had burned themselves into your brain and would remain there.

Hana had greeted you right outside the entrance, saying she had been waiting excitedly for you and was glad to see you.

"It just wasn't the same without you" - she had said.

You had nodded, your mind still mostly occupied by the situation from yesterday. Over and over again your mind was reminding you of your dream, and not the creepy, bloody part that had made you scream so much yesterday you thought you'd be all hoarse today - you weren't - no, it was the previous part of your dream that clouded your every waking thought and wouldn't let you go.

It was that detailed - so real looking - part that made you gulp even now in this crowded library.

It was Iwaizumi, whose strong arms you still thought of, whose hands had caressed your body, the ghost of them still hovering on your skin.

Yet every time you arrived at that spot, every time that spot of your dream reached you and gave you goosebumps once again, Kuroo's dark eyes followed - not dark in their color, no, rather the darkness that had been brewing behind them.

They didn't glow, unlike the eyes of this Kuroo did - the real Kuroo, whose bright eyes often changed to a pitch black.

You leaned wearily against the window sill, the heater beneath warming your legs. The shelves to your right and left were not as crowded as the rest of the library was. That was exactly why you had chosen this spot.

It wasn't full for a Monday, so you would have easily found a place at a table, most likely had found a whole table for yourself, but back here the air was different, you thought - not half as heavy.

Gradually you would have preferred the bloody part of your dream - anything was preferable to Iwaizumi's closeness or Kuroo's eyes.

You shuddered slightly, the book in your hand almost falling out of your hand, but you caught it before it did.

Then you looked up and you wished - yes, really wished - you hadn't.

There he stood,  _ Iwaizumi _ , a good ten meters away at another shelf. The body turned to the many books in front of him, but his head, no, the eyes, those looked at you, followed each of your movements, had focused on you and seemed to want to look nowhere else.

You swallowed. The image of him was called into your memories again, stuck in your mind like an eternal picture - his arms around your body, his hands on your tender skin, and the smile that hit you even now, like a five-ton heavy truck.

You didn't know if he knew anything. Did he? Did he know about your inner conflict? Or the image of him that was haunting your mind?

_ No. _

_ Or did he? _

You continued to refuse to question this, but you couldn't look away from him and the longer you stared at each other so intensely, the more nervous you became.

Your body was incredibly close to melting. Just  _ melting away _ .

The heater you were still leaning against was threatening to burn your legs and you pushed yourself off of it, unclear if it wasn't Iwaizumi's gaze that was making you so hot.

That small movement had made his eyebrows shoot up briefly. Very briefly, two short seconds, but it had been there.

As if he had assumed you would make the first move and walk up to him.

_ Would you? _

_ No. _

_ Or maybe you would? _

Someone walked past him, briefly blocking your view of him, but that was enough to break the spell and the tension, and you looked down at the floor - too afraid to look up again.

Why was it suddenly so hot in here? Just a moment ago you were freezing.

Just now, before... yes, before he was here.

You didn't need to look up again, because you saw someone's dark boots come into your view and you already knew who had stopped in front of you.

He said your name, fast and hurried, very - so very - fleetingly, as if he suspected you would vanish into thin air if he wasn't careful, but you looked up, looked at him, and cursed in your mind that you had done so.

Iwaizumi with his stupid handsome face and distinctive features.

Iwaizumi with the dark eyes that seemed deeper the closer you were to him.

Iwaizumi with the dark hair that was sticking up into the air - almost perfectly - and was - almost perfectly - messy.  _ Strange _ , you thought.

But your eyes fell on his arms, which he had crossed in front of his chest. The dark sweater was quite tight, but now that he unintentionally flexed his arms, the fabric seemed to want to stretch, the sight almost captivating, but you shook your head. You shook your head until those thoughts left and never came back.

He looked at you, visibly confused.

"I haven't said anything yet and you're already shaking your head?" he asked, his voice rough from being quiet for so long.

But you hung on his lips, wishing you could pull yourself together.

_ What was happening to you? _

"Yes, I do," you said. Your mouth spoke before your head had any objections. "I'd like to be alone actually."

You looked to the ground again, intent on ignoring him. You didn't trust yourself right now.

So it didn't help that he was so close to you, still staring at you with that intense gaze, as if you had just picked a star from the sky and presented it to him.

"I wanted to talk to you," he continued simply, as if you hadn't just said you wanted to be alone. Wasn't that obvious enough that you didn't want him here? "Satori said he was with you yesterday."

You swallowed again. There was soon nothing left to swallow, you had swallowed yourself dry and it left a bitter taste in your mouth. Had Satori told him that you had awakened from a nightmare? Had he told him that you had hugged and had that conversation? What consequences would this bring for you? You couldn't imagine that Iwaizumi wouldn't consider that inappropriate. He would surely start talking about you breaking the rules and you feared the worst.

"You let him in," he spoke suddenly. His voice hoarse, not as rough as it had been a moment ago, no, he spoke with a feeling you couldn't quite interpret. "You turned us all away, but him-" he drew his eyebrows together, "him you let in."

For a moment you looked at him speechless - confused and aghast.

You hadn't expected that, nor had you expected him to sound so- so incredibly vulnerable.

Vulnerable was perhaps the wrong word - no, it certainly was - but you didn't know how else to interpret the tone in his voice.

"I-I," you stammered, closing your mouth. You wanted to be mean, maybe even a little sassy, but he had moved closer, even closer than he already was.

He smelled of something that awakened a sense of nostalgia in you, and you almost caught yourself wanting to lean forward.

Again he raised an eyebrow - but this time only one, the right one - and looked at you scrutinizingly.

It shouldn't trigger anything in you, it really shouldn't, yet here you were, your legs threatening to buckle as something in your stomach began to tingle.

_ It was just the stupid dream. The closeness it had shown you wasn't real _ \- at least that's what you tried to tell yourself. It was all just a dream, you're imagining this feeling, you're just imagining this, you-

_ No. You weren't. _

You didn't imagine it and you didn't believe it was just a dream anymore. It was more, it had always been, all of it was something bigger than you, something you couldn't control no matter how hard you tried.

A hand placed itself on your forearm and it burned. It burned incredibly strongly and incredibly pleasantly and you slowly suspected you were going crazy.

You almost wanted to wince and follow up with an "Ouch!" but it hurt so wonderfully - a distant pain that did not do the heat of your body any good at the moment.

Your hands felt warm, not as cold as they usually did.

And you looked into his face again, whatever you felt, he seemed to feel just as strongly.

_ This means nothing _ , you tried to tell yourself,  _ nothing, all this means nothing. _

But you put your free hand on his chest and threw the book in your other hand, carelessly onto the window sill.

You didn't recognize yourself, but this pose you were standing in felt so intimate, so familiar, that it couldn't be wrong, could it?

_ It didn't mean anything. _

Your hand on his chest alone was the necessary sign he had needed to come even closer to you. The free hand that wasn't gripping your forearm now wrapped around your hand that was resting on his chest, squeezing briefly as if to make sure you wouldn't pull it back. Then he came closer, even more closer, and you felt like you were about to burst into flames. You couldn't breathe.

_ That doesn't mean anything. _

He pressed himself against you, you were about to lose each other in the heat, and he moved - so nimbly that you had to  _ just _ blink to miss it - but suddenly his right hand was under your thigh and his left was pressed against the most sensitive part of your back, very close to your waist. And before you could protest, he had lifted you up and pushed you onto the window sill, so that you were now sitting on the edge. He gave you no time to think, pushing himself between you and your legs encircled his waist.

The hand on your thigh wandered up, felt its way up, and ended on the back of your neck.

You already suspected that he would push you forward, but it didn't come to that, you voluntarily leaned forward, against him, closer to him. Closer, closer, closer.

_ That doesn't mean anything. _

You had already closed your eyes and he didn't wait any longer. The hand on the back of your neck moved up even further, getting lost in your hair.

Your skin burned and you felt yourself drawing in air sharply. Nothing helped.

Every place he touched was burning and you didn't know what was happening to you.

You felt his breath on your lips and you knew he was right in front of you, so close - so incredibly close! - you were about to kiss, the faint of his lips hovering on your lips.

_ That doesn't mean anything. _

This wasn't you.

"You let him in, why?" came his question again, and you didn't know how to answer, especially at a moment like this.

You had believed that he loathed your entire being, hated you down to the smallest fiber of your body, and you had believed that you did too. Yet here you were. Pressing against each other, completely lost in the feeling that had been in the air for some time.

It didn't come to the kiss because you sighed, sticking your head up to avoid his and he responded by burying his face in your neck and sighing against your skin.

"I didn't think it was so-," you faltered, the words caught in your throat as you watched him look up, "so important. I didn't think you'd care."

You felt his hand in your hair and for a millisecond he had pulled, so briefly that the pain never came.

"Why shouldn't I care?" he wanted to know, and the question alone confused you more than this sudden affection did.

You were supposed to hate each other, so why? Why did that seem to bother him so much?

And why did you let him treat you that way?

Why did you let him touch you like this when you usually wanted to get away from him with every fiber of your body.

You shuddered as you felt his hand slide back to your neck, where he circled and caressed your exposed skin with his thumb.

Again - he pulled you to him and you didn't complain.

Your answer never came, but that didn't seem to bother him, no, more so the contrary - because he pulled you closer and you could almost think it wouldn't be possible to move any closer, but he proved you wrong.

And he was still thinking that he had to, he had to do this, had to pull you closer to him before the moment and its magic passed and you hated each other again. That would happen, wouldn't it?

_ After all, this doesn't mean anything. _

_ No, all of this, his hand on your back and the other-oh God. _

He put pressure on your neck for a moment and it had felt incredible. The next moment he had pulled you forward and still he waited.

He waited, like he was waiting for the perfect moment, like he was unsure. Was he? Was he unsure if he wanted to kiss you? Your stomach tightened at the thought, and a wave of uncertainty came over you, too.

"God," he breathed out and his hands on your body shook barely noticeably, "you smell so good."

And you whimpered, the sound coming out strained, stuck in your throat for a moment, but had sounded so incredibly needy - so vulnerable - because you wanted this. You wanted this.

_ No, this meant nothing. _

And all at once he was there, pressing his lips against yours and it felt right, right and perfect and the way it should, the way nature had intended. His arms wrapped around your waist, no, they wrapped around you, pulling you closer - passionately, protectively, and even a little possessively - but you didn't mind.

You gave in, but the thought -  _ this means nothing at all _ \- still in your mind, still there.

It was strange, strange how perfectly he melted against your body, how perfectly he fit, there against your chest, you against his, yes, almost suspicious, how your bodies were in harmony and fit together - and you moaned, softly, yet loud enough for him to hear you, so that his hands pressed against your waist, so hard that you were sure they would leave bruises.

_ Still, this meant nothing. _

The sounds he was coaxing out of you seemed to make him more excited, because you felt him, felt something between your legs and you- you took your hands off him, pressed them against his chest and mustered all your strength until you had successfully pushed him away from you to take a deep breath.

He looked at you - something in his eyes that somehow threatened to break your heart - he had wanted to say something, maybe ask why you - yes, why you were pushing him away, but then Kuroo appeared, out of nowhere, beside you and you jumped down from the window sill and quickly fixed your hair and clothes and-

He had noticed, hadn't he?

Kuroo had noticed what had happened here.

Of course he had. He was no stranger to kissing, no matter what body he was in, but it wasn't hard to guess.

You were rarely in a situation where you felt it necessary to make yourself presentable by fixing your clothes.

Maybe it was your exposed neck that looked a little red, or the pink lips that made it extra noticeable.

Still, he was too late, because you had kissed, you had crossed that line, taking advantage of the tension in the air and turning everything upside down - your relationship with each other now even more confusing than it already was.

"Do my eyes deceive me, or-" he moved closer, looking you up and down, "did I just come at the right moment?"

"More likely at the worst time possible," Iwaizumi replied, his eyes glaring in Kuroo's direction. But he didn't seem angry with you, and you didn't know if he was now blaming your reaction on Kuroo's appearance.

"Don't be shy just because I showed up," Kuroo called out, looking at you in turns, something challenging resonating in his gaze, but you felt ashamed. "Pick up where you just left off, honestly!"

The undertone in his voice made you shudder again, but Iwaizumi seemed to have noticed it as well and now turned his body around to face the other player.

He wanted to say something in return, to respond bitingly - you could tell by the look on his face - but he didn't get around to it, because whatever he was thinking was now reflected on his face, whereupon he drew his eyebrows together and stared urgently at Kuroo. It was nerve-wracking.

"Why exactly do you have to butt in right now and involve yourself in our conversation?" asked Iwaizumi, visibly irritated, but also angry - angrier than you had seen him before.

This was a different kind of anger, an icy one that put his other temperamental, passionate anger in a different light.

No, this one was so different that you looked at him twice, then a third time before looking at Kuroo to interpret his reaction to it, because whatever was bubbling and threatening to burst out of Iwaizumi seemed unnatural.

Unnatural in the sense that it came neither from the true Iwaizumi nor from the red-eyed creature that had taken possession of him, which now upon reflection, made you realize once again how stupid it had actually been of you to give into that kiss.

"Oh my, do I do that? Am I interrupting your  _ conversation _ ?" Kuroo grinned - treacherous and sly and knowing. He turned to the man next to him now, and the two of them looked at each other for a long moment.

The mood between them switched and instantly your thoughts drifted, just taking in how it felt; electrifying, tense, and heavy.

You drew in your breath sharply, had done so unintentionally, but for half a second they had looked away from each other to look at you. They noticed your worried look, because - honestly - that's what you were. Worried, scared and frightened.

"So I'm right. Or are you going to deny it-deny that you kissed in this dull library, among dusty bookshelves?"

"Do we have to?" questioned Iwaizumi directly, and you no longer had to wonder where the rest of the group had gone to, because they had already found you- the little discussion between Kuroo and Iwaizumi not exactly quiet. "I don't think we need to try to deny anything. Unless you think it was a mistake on our part? It wasn't. We kissed, but I don't need to give you an explanation there. I suggest you leave us alone-"

He would have continued, but then he noticed the others, who didn't exactly sneak up on you inconspicuously, but came to a stop right next to Kuroo and Iwaizumi with perplexed looks on their faces before looking at you.

And like every time, you literally jumped out of your skin, because the fear that their eyes were causing was still present, as well as the intensity they brought with them, and when it hit you, five pairs of eyes at the same time, you couldn't help but flinch, which in this case you couldn't, because you just bumped into the heater again and wanted to avoid doing so a second time.

If Iwaizumi's anger didn't express itself so "wrongly," reflectung so  _ icily _ , and bubble up so wickedly, then he could turn to you, then he could forget about Kuroo's face, but it didn't seem to want to let him go, and the longer he had to put up with Kuroo's smug smile, the angrier he became.

"What's wrong?", Oikawa wanted to know, a wrinkle of thought between his eyebrow that looked exceedingly strange on his flawless face.

"Nothing," Kuroo replied, "nothing at all. They were just making out a bit."

"What?!", Lev and Bokuto had shouted out at the same time, too loudly for your liking, and the utterance of your newfound sin made you want to sink into the ground.

Oikawa's little wrinkle, meanwhile, loosened and disappeared, only to return and anchor itself even deeper between his eyebrows this time.

Terushima laughed contemptuously, clicked his tongue, and pushed his way out from between Lev and Bokuto to step closer.

"So the rules really don't mean anything anymore?" he asked, "so I can just kiss her whenever I want to?"

" _ Luteus _ ," Oikawa spoke, and Terushima's head had turned to the brown-haired man so quickly that you knew - no, were sure - it was his name.  _ The other name _ .

"No," groaned the blond furiously, for who of them could have understood how he had felt the entire time? Because he had been allowed to taste you. He had already kissed you and you had kissed him back and it had been perfect, but then it had never happened again and he had spent every day searching and yearning for that feeling in such a way that he thought he would go crazy. And now Iwaizumi was standing here in front of you, when he had constantly mentioned how much he actually detested you, hated you, would have loved to just send you to eternal damnation and take any kind of punishment just to get rid of you. And then he had the impudence, yes, the complete audacity, to play with you in your most vulnerable state? To touch you?

"What's stopping me from getting closer to her? What is there any longer? No more rules, no more structure, and certainly no more scintilla of truth"

"It was based on mutual interest," Iwaizumi said, and you flinched. Because it did, it had...  _ but it had meant nothing, absolutely nothing. _

"Look, look," Kuroo called excitedly - too excitedly. You didn't understand why he was suddenly so cocky. "The princess has lost her prudishness and now no longer dwells among the dead."

You grimaced in annoyance.

What the hell was that about now?

And you almost said that out loud and followed up with a " _ Fuck you, Kuroo _ ," but Iwaizumi beat you to it.

"You don't seem to understand your position." he stated, cool and calculated and still so, so angry. The iciness in his voice sent a shiver down your spine and made even Satori come out from the far corner. He stopped right next to them and eyed them appraisingly.

"A little absurd to hear that come out of your mouth," he said back bitingly, and that was the first time you noticed any sort of anger behind Kuroo's facade. It triggered a memory, an image -  _ your dream _ \- and his eyes, which had looked the same in it.

That wasn't anger anymore. This was the same darkness, the same hinting that you had seen in your dream.

"Really," Iwaizumi said, "because I mean to know that I have the upper hand here, and you must follow my lead."

"I simply _ refuse _ ," Kuroo replied, and Satori couldn't take his eyes off the two of them, kind of like how the two couldn't stop staring challengingly at each other.

But Satori's reaction to their argument struck you as odd, even inappropriate.

He seemed to be sympathizing, waiting, expecting something, and you didn't know why.

Maybe you should leave?

Not interfere here and defuse the situation?

Before you could even make an effort to leave, Iwaizumi had grabbed a hold of you.

His hand had snapped out and wrapped around your wrist.

Briefly, he took his eyes from Kuroo to look at you, to show you that it was important to him that you best not leave, not now.

"Please don't go," he murmured softly, but you understood, heard it loud and clear, and your heart almost slipped into your stomach.

It was a difference when they were rough with you, as sad as it sounded you were used to it by now, but when he - (Iwaizumi, of all people Iwaizumi!) - spoke to you in a soft voice and just as carefully told you something like that, then it just came across very differently, it seemed more significant.

And you just nodded, listened to him and jerked back to your little place at the window sill.

Kuroo had been watching this intently, and when Iwaizumi looked back at him, he did the same, and they stared each other down again.

Satori had crossed his arms as he watched this.

"Did you guys suddenly make a secret agreement?" asked Kuroo, looking at you in irritation.

Iwaizumi didn't answer and it reminded Satori back to the day he had not only argued with Bokuto but also almost punched him in the face. The redhead saw the parallels and leaned even further forward.

"I changed my mind, you should go," Iwaizumi said, clearly directed at you, and you opened your mouth to reply.

"Why so obedient?", Kuroo beat you to it instead, asking you accusingly.

"I-," you started, really eager to state your opinion, to defend yourself, but you didn't get around to it.

"I don't think you should have any opinion on this" - Iwaizumi said, addressing Kuroo, blinking, and opening his eyes, the red glow stood out like ember - "you're really getting on my nerves."

"Oho!" exclaimed Kuroo, his eyes narrowing to slits. "Showing a new side of yourself?  _ Ruber _ the protector?"

You saw Iwaizumi's jaw tighten. His right hand shook slightly, but he tried to pull himself together while still clenching his hands into fists.

"You guys don't want to fight in the library right now, right? Because-", Terushima didn't get to finish his sentence because Iwaizumi had grabbed him by the collar and shoved him back to the others.

Terushima was about to go straight back towards the black-haired male, when Iwaizumi's gaze focused on him.

Whatever he saw in the red eyes that you didn't, he seemed to obey, coming from the deepest instincts to make him listen to him. He stood behind Satori to continue observing the situation and pouted barely noticeably, you realized, even as he now shamefully avoided your gaze.

"Satori," Iwaizumi spoke, again his hand coming out, which this time he didn't put around your wrist, but locked his with your hand and pulled you to him.

You bumped against him without him moving much because of the impact, but your closeness seemed to trigger a dislike not only with Kuroo, but the others as well.

Still, it remained quiet and you tried to break away from him a bit and move away, but he wouldn't let you and - honestly - you didn't try hard enough.

"Take her away," he said, but Kuroo was already protesting.

"What-what game are you playing,  _ Hajime _ ?"

You didn't know anymore if using the first name was intentional- a small hope that  _ he _ would come forth and stop the creature with the glowing red eyes.

"I'm not playing a game," he explained, "I'm just tired of your face, and I don't think she should be in your presence or theirs" - he pointed at the others, expertly ignoring Satori.

"Wait a minute," Kuroo reached out to you now, would have loved to pull you to his side, but Iwaizumi backed away, with you in tow, as if your lives depended on it.

"From today on, you have no right to be near her," Iwaizumi decided.

"Me-just me? Just me-I'm the only one excluded from seeing her?"

You could tell Kuroo was trying not to lose his temper, in fact he was doing a pretty good job of it, because his expression was so different from the usual Kuroo, it was hard to look away.

"Right, I don't trust you, and to be honest... your face just pisses me off."

"Very mature," Kuroo replied. You almost wanted to think that he was right, Iwaizumi didn't really seem to be thinking logically, but the anger that was now visible in his face was so foreign to you that you would think that this was a  _ deeper _ thing. Yet something that even Kuroo didn't seem to understand.

Iwaizumi's eyes narrowed, his eyebrows drew together, and his jaw tightened. His pupils seemed to quiver and shake, it was frightening to watch, and you jerked slightly to the side - towards Kuroo, even if it was unintentional - and the other black-haired male reacted quickly.

Kuroo's hand found yours and he pulled you behind him as if to protect you from Iwaizumi and Satori.

Which only resulted in an almost animalistic growl coming from Iwaizumi's throat, causing you to freeze.

He wanted to snap at you and pull you back, but before he reacted but still leaned forward, it sparked a memory that made him wince.

A single, brief image had flashed in his mind, fighting its way out of the deepest corner of his memory and drawing attention to itself.

He stumbled back, so far that he bumped into a shelf, causing it to shake.

Satori had watched everything tensely, and though Iwaizumi's reaction captivated you and made you think, you eyed the redhead, whose reaction was just as strange.

Iwaizumi, however, pushed himself as far away from you as possible. His eyes were wide in shock until he caught himself - rather quickly - and narrowed them to slits once more.

He inhaled and exhaled deeply a few times and walked back to you with strong steps. Without ifs or buts, he pulled you back and you could barely voice an objection before you were shoved into Satori's chest.

"Take her away. Now." he said to Satori, who nodded and signaled you to come along.

And you did, because you felt that if anyone had the answers to this strange situation, it was him.

Satori was the answer.

You just had to ask the right questions, but wondered if the others had noticed?

Did they know that Satori knew more than they did? Had they gradually figured it out and put the pieces of the puzzle together?

You hurried after him as he led you through the library and headed for the exit. Before you turned the corner, however, you had looked over your shoulder once more. Everyone except Iwaizumi and Kuroo stared after you, but you didn't know why Oikawa's green burned on your back the most. His eyes had glowed poison green, his features contorted with envy.

Satori's steps were quick and nimble; you had to hurry to keep up with him.

The library had five floors and you had, without much consideration, stayed on the fourth floor and used its exit as well, which was why you now had to fight your way through the crowded hallways however, as many of your fellow students were now leaving the lecture rooms and heading for the library - that was so generally the charm of the fourth floor, which was always full with students.

You almost lost him in all this chaos, tripping over several bags and trying to speed up.

You followed him - you didn't really know yourself why you didn't just let go - and you went up the stairs to the fifth floor, where it was much less crowded.

You finally decided to speak up.

"What was that?" you called after him, and he finally made an effort to stop.

Before he did, he wanted to leave the next group behind, but when he finally came to a stop - the open lecture hall right behind you - he didn't turn to you, preferring to look into the hall to make sure it was indeed empty.

"What do you mean?" he asked, and you almost had to grimace. He knew what you meant, you were sure of it.

"Your face... you"-you sighed and ran a hand through your hair-"you were waiting for something. You were expecting something, and you weren't subtle about it."

He shook his head. Very briefly, only to sigh. You barely recognized the redhead in front of you.

His expression was serious, tense, and he seemed to be plagued by an impatience you hadn't seen before. You were not used to this sight of him.

"That was nothing," he lied - again.

You looked at him - not quite buying anything that he said -, then walked toward the open window to look out and shook your head.

"So much for your promise," you muttered, but he had heard you loud and clear.

He took a step in your direction, you felt him behind you.

"You're right. No more secrets." He stepped to your side. "But some things...I can't tell you, not because I don't want to, but I'm not in a position to."

"You mean because it involves someone I know too?" you probed.

"No... it is not permitted to me. I'm not allowed to and I can't, it won't work even if I wanted to. There's so much you don't understand yet, but you remember, right? Your dream?"

You nodded.

"Yes, I think I dreamt the exact same thing again today. It felt nostalgic. Can you at least explain to me why I'm having these dreams?"

"I can't," he said, his voice breaking.

You saw his inner conflict in his face, recognized the struggle he was having with himself and possibly the many secrets that were so slowly trying to bubble up into the light of day.

"What do you know, Satori," you whispered, and he flinched.

You looked out the large window down onto the campus and watched the many students walking around.

"What did you expect from them? Just now in the library.", you tried your luck again, the hope for new information too great.

He looked at you for a moment, then eyed the window and the height critically, but opened his mouth slightly.

"I expected them to remember," he said, and you frowned.

"What, exactly? What exactly were you hoping they'd remember?"

He shook his head. His eyes told you that you were close, but it seemed almost physically impossible for him to give you the answers you asked for. Maybe if you phrased it differently? Maybe you would have to be smarter about it.

"You can't answer me, I get it..." - you pondered for a moment - "they were close, weren't they? I've never seen you like this before, that means they were close to remembering. You saw something that was different about them. Because I did, too. I mean Iwaizumi... but also Kuroo, I could tell they weren't the best of friends, but that fight earlier... that was out of character, right?"

Something flashed in his eyes briefly, and you were riveted by it.

But then he shook his head.

"That...  _ wasn't _ uncharacteristic," you said thoughtfully and had meant to continue, but he nodded - the fire in his eyes back to confirm your train of thought and its questions.

"It wasn't uncharacteristic, that's why it came out of nowhere! You were already used to it, but... that doesn't usually happen? I mean, yeah, they're fighting, all of you are just barely getting along when you're not at each other's throats... I don't get it, if that wasn't uncharacteristic, was it Iwaizumi and Kuroo? The real ones, I mean." - Satori had almost wanted to shake his head again, but you just kept talking - "No, that doesn't make sense. You were talking about remembering... that is the past, right? You expected them to remember, but not per se the beings within them, but-"

You were incredibly confused. Your head was racing and you didn't even know if you were close, but then you felt Satori's warm hand settle on your shoulder-like an old friend, very different from the rest of the Six.

"A little more," he said, and that was indeed the reassurance you had needed.

"I don't understand, Satori. You don't seem to mean then - not the beings that have taken possession of students, but also not the boys themselves, I-"

Kuroo's dark eyes flashed into your thoughts and you winced, so hard that Satori's hand even slipped from your shoulder.

"I'm going to take a wild guess that-"

You swallowed. Were you going to say what you were thinking and thus make this that much more real? The nightmares alone already made you think you were crazy, but when you would speak them out, yes, spoke them loud and clear into the universe, you feared it would become real - no matter if it already was or not.

"If my dreams are real...were real...does it mean the people in them were, too? Are they the people you once were, Satori? Is that what you wanted them to remember? The past? Their real past?"

His face changed abruptly. A smile spread across what had earlier been a far too serious face. It was warm, reached his eyes and made him look incredibly young.

Your skin tingled while you looked at him, because the smile was meant only for you. And if he could have stopped smiling, he would have thanked you, instead he nodded. He smiled, nodded and was so incredibly grateful to you.

A new chapter was coming upon you, because you would help Satori and you would also help the others. You were going to make them remember. You were going to break their curse and bring an end to their wicked games.


End file.
